Death's Deception
by DarkHorseBlueSky
Summary: I wasn't really sure how to react when a son of Hades dropped into my room while I was taking a nap. A regular girl would have screamed. I wasn't regular. Hence whacking him with my staff. Being a half-blood can make you react in strange ways. (Formerly titled Saige Thanem and the Betrayal of the Ghost King. Sporadically NicoxOC; you'll see what I mean.)
1. Chapter 1

******Takes place in that vague gaping hole of time between TLH and SoN.**

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******Chapter 1**

**I Try to Kill the Ghost King (See the Irony?)**

I wasn't really sure how to react when a son of Hades dropped into my room while I was taking a nap. A regular girl would have screamed. I wasn't regular. Hence whacking him with my staff. Being a half-blood can make you react in strange ways.

So here's how it started. It had just been a normal day for me, which meant that I woke up sometime around three in the morning (yes, you heard me right, three _in the morning_, because shadow traveling's hard for me in the day), slipped out of my apartment by way of the fire escape –– because I suspected that the man who always loitered around the front entrance was a monster –– led a life-risking infiltration into some top-notch fashion store, and stole another bottle of perfume.

Yeah, I know. Perfume. Me. Um…no. But hey, it works. There's just something in Givenchy's fruit of passion that drives those monsters nuts. And the moment of distraction that it takes them to scrunch up their noses, or whatever smelling apparatus they might have, is enough for me to paralyze them and turn them into little piles of black dust.

Anyway, I had just gotten back from exercising, otherwise known as being chased through Central Park by a dozen bloodthirsty dracaenae, and was so tired that all I had time for was eating the Big Mac that had gotten me chased in the first place before crashing on the ratty couch in my tiny apartment.

I lived alone in an apartment building in the worse part of New York City. No one knew I lived there, not even the landlord, who was usually drunk. And if he did know that I lived there, even when he was sober, he probably wouldn't care. No one, except for the desperate, would ever want to pay to live in the dump that my apartment was. But it just so happened that I was desperate, so it was perfect. Ah, home sweet home. With the burned-out lights, the ever-running toilet, and the nest of rats that hardly ever dared show heads nor tails to me.

I'm not sure exactly how long I slept but what I do know is that when I awoke, the moon had just come up and was shining through my window and into my face. I flinched and squeezed my eyes shut again. Too bright, I would have mused aloud. Instead I stood up, limped over to the window, and yanked the black curtain over it. The room was delved into darkness, but I didn't care. I could handle the dark.

But I had just lain back down on the couch when I felt that strange tight feeling in my stomach. It wasn't hunger. It wasn't a cramp. Something was wrong. Someone was coming.

I closed my eyes, dropped my hand over the side of the couch, and feigned sleep as I kept the fingers of my left hand loosely around the shaft of my weapon, a wooden staff with a magical amethyst tip embedded into the end. The feeling in my stomach intensified, but then, suddenly, it was released. A millisecond later, I heard a thud and an "Oof!". From _inside my room._

I could sense the aura of the newcomer in the fringes of my consciousness. I'm not sure how, but I had always been able to sense creatures of the Underworld, like hellhounds and ghosts. But this aura was different –– darker, more solid. A mortal. No, not a mortal, exactly. A demigod. A demigod with the aura of death about them. Another like me, I wondered? I reasoned that they hadn't come through the door, or even the fire escape. No. They had come through shadow travel.

I could hear the subtle sounds as he got up, the clink of a chain and the chafing of fabric. I imagined that he would be looking around now –– which, in fact, he was doing –– and I knew what he'd see. He'd see a tiny, rundown apartment, and a ratty couch pushed against the wall with a girl sprawled out on it. He'd see that she had choppy, dark brown hair and deathly pale skin, and was skinnier than a supermodel even though she looked about twelve years old. She wore ratty, worn clothes: ripped jeans, a black t-shirt, a denim jacket, and dirty black Converse. Her left hand, with a black leather cuff bracelet around the bony wrist, spilled off the couch and was loosely holding a straight wooden staff that looked like its sole use would be in support for old people, which could not be further from the truth.

And if you're wondering, the girl I've been describing is me.

I could hear his footsteps as he approached, but only barely. He moved as quietly as a mouse. I would have been impressed, had I not been so preoccupied in making sure I looked like I was asleep. I could sense him as he stopped right in front of my couch, and I could hear him as he breathed.

It was then that I decided to put an end to all this.

He'd stopped within striking range of my staff, and I mentally calculated on how fast I'd have to move to get a perfect shot. He didn't see my hand as it closed its grip on the shaft.

My amber eyes opened, and I flew into action.

Almost as if out of its own volition, my staff flew up and knocked him in the jaw. It had been the side without the crystal point, so he was only stunned by the impact and stumbled. With surprising speed, he recovered and drew a black sword from a sheath at his hip, but before he could use it he found the violet crystal tip of my staff an inch from his throat, and froze.

"You don't want to learn what this does the hard way," I advised coldly, giving him my best glare.

He met my scowl boldly. His eyes were piercing, and as black as night. My gaze on him didn't waver, but out of my peripheral vision I examined him. Really, he was no older than I was, possibly younger. He was also skinny and pale underneath his ratty, dark clothes. For some reason, he seemed kind of familiar, and I started to wonder if Father might have had two children. No. That was impossible.

I glanced down at his sword. It was a black blade, as dark as if it was carved out of a shadow. "Stygian iron," I remarked, gesturing at it with my chin.

The boy's black eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"

"That's a Stygian iron blade," I repeated. "Where'd you get it?"

I could see that he was confused by my casual tone, as if I wasn't holding a magical spear under his chin. "Who are you?" he asked.

"That wasn't my question," I said. "Where'd you get the sword?"

"That wasn't my question either," he shot back. "Who are you?"

I raised an eyebrow. This kid had a lot of nerve, talking to me like that. I sighed, and reasoned that there was no easy way around this other than the direct. "Drop it." Reluctantly, he knelt, placed it on the ground, and stood up. My staff followed his every move. "You're a demigod." I wasn't afraid to say it.

At these three words, he also raised an eyebrow. "Maybe."

"Who's your parent?"

He glanced down at the amethyst point of my staff and gave what might have qualified as a mischievous smile, although to me it looked a little more like a scowl. I realized the obvious, that he wouldn't talk as long as my freezer was this close to him. Reasonable, I thought, but not for me.

"What?" I inquired. "You want my freezer away from you?"

His brow furrowed. "Your freezer?"

"My freezer."

"Why do you call it that?"

Just that moment one of the rats that shared the apartment with me scurried across the floor. Almost without thinking, I withdrew my staff, swung it around in a lazy circle, brushed the amethyst tip against the rat's body, and returned the staff back to its original position under the boy's neck within the space of three seconds. He was staring at the poor rat, which was now as still as a Medusa victim. In about five to ten minutes the magic would wear off and it'd be free to run again, but until then it would ornament my floor. Frozen. (I chose not to tell him that the magic wore off.) I shrugged in answer to his question and said sarcastically, "I don't know."

He was silent. So I asked casually, "What's your name?" He didn't answer. I sighed. "We have all night."

"Nico di Angelo."

I raised my eyebrows. He had said it like he had expected me to be impressed. "Oh, so I'm holding the mighty and exalted Nico di Angelo over my freezer. Forgive me, majesty, and make yourself comfortable in my humble abode."

He wasn't impressed, and I didn't lower my staff. "I told you my name," he said stubbornly. "Tell me yours."

"Saige Thanem."

"You're a demigod, too."

I met his calm dark gaze with my equally calm amber gaze. "Maybe."

"Who are you?"

"I already told you. Saige Thanem."

"No, I mean _who are you? _Did you work for Kronos?"

"You mean, the gyro company?"

He snorted. "The Titan lord. Apparently not."

"No, seriously, who's Kronos?"

Nico rolled his eyes. "No one. Never mind."

I shook my head. Stupid ADHD. "You know, I can't help but notice that we're at something of an impasse –– you want to you who I am, I want to know who you are and why you're in my house."

Nico glanced around skeptically. "Your house?"

"Apartment. Whatever. But anyway, back to the original subject, which we keep deviating from due to ADHD on both of our parts –– "

"How did you know about that?"

I stared at him. "It's called deductive reasoning. We're both demigods, we're both fighters, and we may very well be siblings."

His eyes widened, and I swear I heard him let out a small gag. "What?"

I rolled my eyes. Boys could be so clueless. "Look at us. We don't exactly look like Apollo's kids, if that's what you're wondering." Him, with his Stygian iron sword, messy black hair, and black eyes. Me, with my magical staff, choppy dark brown hair, and honey gold eyes. Both of us, with our skinny bodies, pale skin, and dark, moody appearances. Who else could we be? I disliked the idea, but any other was impossible.

"But that's impossible," he blurted, as if he read my thoughts. "Bianca, Hazel, and I were the only ones."

"Not anymore," I said.

"But how could he keep you hidden?"

"You're here, aren't you? And those other girls. He kept you three hidden, it's easy enough for me."

He closed his eyes, and I could almost see the gears turning in his brain. "Think fast," I said. "My arm's starting to hurt." It was. It's not easy to hold a magical staff under someone's neck for that long, even for someone as wiry as me.

He sighed. "Okay. Let's just assume that we're not going to kill each other, and you can put your staff down."

I considered this. "On one condition."

"Name it."

"My life is one of mutual trust," I continued. "I have to know that I can trust you, and undoubtfully you have to know that you can trust me. So let's just assume that we both trust each other, which is not true, and bear the knowledge that the other will probably strike back if one of us strikes first."

Nico seemed to be thinking about these words, and said, "True."

"Do you agree?"

"To what, specifically?"

"Our alliance."

"For how long?"

"Undetermined. As long as we need each other, which starts at about three seconds."

If my freezer wasn't under his neck, and following his every movement, he probably would have nodded. "Yeah. Sure."

"And likewise." I set my staff down, switched it to my other hand, and shook out my arm to get the blood flowing back into it. Man, did that feel good. As he picked his Stygian iron sword off the ground, I waited for him to swing it, but he only slid it into its sheath at his belt. So I shrugged and waltzed over to the pantry in the corner kitchen of my apartment. "Want something to eat?"

I could almost feel the confusion radiating from him. "Sure, I guess."

I opened the pantry. "Well…" I said, examining the contents of the pantry, "we have stale bread, peanut butter, a bit of ambrosia, dust, something that is either a decomposed ballet slipper or a moldy banana and…oh look, more dust."

I glanced back at Nico. He frowned. "Never mind. I'll pass."

I nodded and slammed the pantry shut. "I thought so. Now let's get down to business."

"Business?" he repeated as I approached, twirling my staff leisurely.

"Who _are_ you, Nico di Angelo?" I snarled, approaching him with my signature scowl on my face. "You came here for a reason. Why are you here?"

Every word in the last question was coated with acid. By now he was up against the wall. I was less than a foot away from him, and we were locked in a head to head staredown. He was taller than me, I realized, but I made up for the couple inches by scowling more fiercely than he did. "I, uh…don't really know," he confessed. "I was going to California. Shadow traveling, actually. And somehow I ended up here."

I didn't flinch. I wasn't buying it.

"Look," he said. "I'll take you to the camp. Just –– "

My eyebrows flew up, and I took a few steps back. "The camp?"

He hesitated before replying. "Camp Half-Blood."

The name rung a bell with me. Unfortunately, that bell was a warning bell and reflexively, I held up my staff like a rifle and aimed it at him. I didn't have to touch him with the amethyst tip to freeze him. "You didn't tell me you were here from the camp."

"I didn't think it was relevant," he replied, with a hint of amusement in his voice.

"Well, you thought wrong." Then another thought occurred to me, and I lowered my staff. "You can't be from the camp. They don't accept us."

"They do now," he said, and at this I cocked my head.

"Since when?"

"The Battle for Manhattan, when Kronos was defeated. When we won, a son of Poseidon made a deal with the gods that all demigods would be claimed and sent to camp to train. I can't believe Father didn't claim you yet."

I shrugged and flopped back down on my couch. "Eh, he's like that sometimes. Forgetful. And what's the point of being claimed when there's no one except mortals and monsters to witness?"

He considered this. "Good point. You've been to the camp?"

"Snuck in just 'cause I felt like having strawberries for dinner. No intentions of staying, but whatever."

"When was that? And what did they do?" As if he really cared, he sat down next to me on the couch. Far enough away not to touch me or my staff, but still close enough for it to be uncomfortable. _Why?_ I asked myself. _He's my brother. And I'm still uncomfortable about sitting next to him._ Eh, a boy's a boy any way you see him.

"It was a couple years ago. And they didn't do much, just locked me in a closet while I was unconscious. When I woke up, they let me out, and I bolted without another word. Never came back."

Nico stared at me, and if I've ever gotten self-conscious, it was now, in front of a boy who very well might be my half brother. "Well," he said, "why not?"

I shrugged again. "I dunno. Probably because there was a horse dude with a bow whom I think I might have ticked off by freezing him and a god who looked like he wanted to turn me into a dolphin because I stole his Diet Coke." It was true. Every word of it.

For the first time since I'd met him, I saw a flicker of a smile on Nico's face. Then it was gone. "That would be Chiron and Dionysus."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever. Them. Do you know if the wine dude really wants to turn me into a dolphin?"

Another brief smile. "The wine dude?"

"Use deductive reasoning, boy. Dionysus."

"Probably. I'm not sure if he's ever done it to any demigod, but he won't if Chiron's there."

I scrutinized him. My choices: go with this kid to the camp where I very well might just lose either my life or what bit of freedom I had left, or stay here and boot his behind all the way back to his camp without me. The second option was quite appealing, but in a way I kind of wanted to go with him. I'd only ever had one home, and that was with my mom. She had died a few years back, and so I'd gone to my dad. He'd said that no, as much as he loved Diane, he couldn't bring her back from the dead. _Couldn't,_ I had said, _or didn't want to?_ Now, I knew that speaking this way to a god, especially my dad, would usually get a person turned into a small fuzzy mammal. But instead, Dad had gazed into my eyes and hung his head. I could see he hated not being allowed to bring his beloved wife back out the Doors of Death. I could see he hated to leave me alone. But staying with him was not a pleasant option, and none of my mortal relatives would take me in. So I left. I'd roamed the streets ever since. Completely alone.

And now this Nico kid was giving me a chance for change. For a home, and a potential family at this camp. I wasn't sure which way to go. If I went with him, my life of freedom might be taken away from me. I knew about Camp Half-Blood. I knew that it was a camp to train demigods, and I knew that abnormal powers were accepted there. But I wasn't sure if they'd accept me and _my_ abnormal powers. Maybe I was too…extreme. Maybe I wasn't good enough for them. Maybe they'd throw me out, like everyone else had.

But they'd accepted Nico, at least, it sounded like they had. He said he wasn't exactly from the camp, and yet he said that they accepted kids like me and him and those Hazel and Bianca girls. Huh, the attention deficit part of my mind said. I wonder what it's like having sisters. I'd never known what that felt like. I barely even remembered what it felt like to be loved. I wondered if they'd like me.

"All right," I said finally. "I'll go."

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**Okay, I know, this one wasn't that big of a cliffhanger, but you'll get them soon, once things start to speed up. Trust me.**

**I'm a-putting the disclaimer down here because I feel like it, and because I read somewhere that a long AN at the beginning of your story might turn people away, and I did have a very long AN at the beginning of my story:**

**I don't own anything except my OC.**

**Review! I want to know how much you like it so far! Pretty please review, even if you don't know what to say! We all know it sucks when you have five hundred views and two reviews saying "Good" after a week of the story being up. **

**I'll probably still keep the story going even if I _don't_ get any reviews, because I'm persistent, but maybe if I get enough, they'll go up faster.**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Just to let you know, I probably will not update this often. This is a test to see if I can figure out how to use this stupid thing. Again, this is my first multi-chap fanfic.**

**Read and review. I know you're there. Contrary to common belief, I want to hear you.**

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**Chapter 2**

**I Invade Nico's Personal Space**

We decided to shadow travel. The camp wasn't far, so it wouldn't take too much out of me. I could shadow travel; I'd done it before. Apparently Nico had, too.

So I gathered my few belongings and stuffed them into my backpack. I had an extra set of clothes, a bit of ambrosia, an emergency vial of nectar, a nearly empty wallet, some emergency candy bars, toothpaste, a toothbrush, a hairbrush, my journal, a few pens, and my perfume bottles. Anything else I owned I was wearing on my personage. When Nico saw me put the perfume bottles in my backpack, he almost smiled. I caught the amused smirk and glared. Without saying anything, he gestured to the glass bottles, then at me, and raised an eyebrow. Also without saying anything, I picked a perfume bottle, stood up, and spritzed him in the face. Initially, he coughed, and then he asked indignantly, "What was _that_ for?"

"You were annoying me," I said.

"That's not an answer. Why do you have it?"

"Monster repellent," I replied, spritzing myself three times. "They hate Givenchy. Who wouldn't?"

He scrunched up his nose. "It smells like Hawaiian Punch."

"I know," I said.

"I hate Hawaiian Punch."

"Me too. But you'll hate being pulverized by the Minotaur even more if you don't wear it. Trust me, he hates it so much he'd turn on his heel and run back to Tartarus."

He didn't remark about the perfume after that.

When I'd gotten my stuff, I checked to make sure I had everything. I touched the gold drachma necklace around my neck, which I had gotten as a gift from my dad. Good, it was still there. "Ready?" asked Nico.

I thought for a second. "Probably."

"Camp Half-Blood, Long Island," he said, and took my free hand as we stepped into the shadows.

I felt uncomfortable holding his hand. It was as cold as ice, and I could bet that mine was the same to him. But if we hadn't, he might end up in Camp Half-Blood alone, while I'd end up in Saskatchewan. I'd never really gotten a hang of the whole shadow travel thing, and occasionally I'd get free trips to Germany when I really wanted to go to a McDonald's. So in case my shadow portal went somewhere I didn't mean to, I was holding Nico's hand so I'd be pulled in by him instead. Well, I had said, isn't there a chance that you'd go with me instead of me going with you? He shook his head no, but didn't say why. I thought I knew. Despite his weak, awkward appearance, he was strong. He was the most powerful demigod I'd ever met. Even more than _me._ And that was saying a lot, cocky as I was. If I started to stray, his power would pull me back on track.

Even though I sucked at it, I loved shadow travel. It reminded me of this one roller coaster I had gone on with my mum when she was still alive, on one of those few times that we had had the money to go to somewhere expensive and fun. Except that it was dark, which made it all the more awesome. For the brief, thrilling moments that we were suspended in the darkness, traveling through the shadows, all I could feel were the cold shivers up my spine and the even colder grip Nico had on my hand.

And then we popped out into the light, and I heard a few people scream.

Actually, it wasn't really light. Just a bit of dim firelight. The campers had just begun dispersing from a campfire gathering, and we had landed under a tree, right behind a cluster of demigods. For a few moments, all I could register was blurred shapes and an aching pain in my backside after falling on the hard ground.

"Nico!" a girl's voice scolded. "Don't _do_ that!"

"Sorry, Katie," Nico apologized, then he helped me up. Things were still a bit fuzzy from my painful landing on that stupid tree root, but after shaking my head a couple times to clear my vision I saw everything. Nico, of course, was there, along with four or five campers, all of which would look at home in a garden.

"Who's she?" one of them whispered, loud enough for me to hear. Nico silenced him with a look. I yawned.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," I replied, stifling another yawn. "Just a bit…tired. I don't do that very much."

"I'll get you to the Big House," he said as he led me away from the campfire and the gaping Demeter kids. "Chiron will –– "

"What about me?" asked a voice amidst the thudding of hooves on the ground. A white centaur came galloping towards us, and out of habit I gripped my staff.

"Hi Chiron," said Nico stiffly. "This is Saige."

"Ah, a new demigod," replied the centaur. "Who's your parent, child?"

I said nothing. I'm not sure if I could have even if I wanted to. No one liked to hear it, so I wasn't used to telling anyone.

"Can we talk in private?" asked Nico. Chiron glanced at me.

"Go ahead," I said. "I'll just wait here."

I slumped under a tree as the very odd pair walked away. Some of the campers stared at me, and a couple of them waved. I didn't wave back. I felt very conspicuous and out of place amidst all of the orange t-shirts. After a while, Chiron and Nico returned. Chiron seemed maybe a tiny bit wary of me, but he said, "You can take her to cabin thirteen. I'll order that a bed be brought for her. Make her feel at home, Nico."

Then he galloped off without a word. I couldn't help but notice how his lower half, the horse part, was white, while his hair on his head was brown…how did that work? I was snapped out of my momentary distraction when Nico said, "Come on. I'll take you to our cabin."

_"Our_ cabin?" I inquired as I stood up and trotted after him.

"Yeah," he said shortly. "Cabin thirteen."

As we trekked over to the so-called "cabin thirteen", Nico and I attracted more stares. It was obvious that he wasn't a common visitor to Camp Half-Blood, and even more uncommon was the fact that he had a girl with a magical staff at his side. Some people whispered, and both of us ignored them.

He stopped in front of a building that I supposed was cabin thirteen. "Here we are," he said awkwardly. "Home sweet home."

It was anything but sweet, and one could hardly call it a home. In other words, it was awesome. It was a one-story building, with obsidian walls and strange green torches that glowed eerily in the night. The large brass number 13 hung above the door in the shadows under the roof, right above a large silver skull with creepy emerald eyes. The silver doors had carved skulls and gargoyles in the repousse work, and as he pushed them open a gust of cool air washed over me. The cabin was dim, just as I liked it, and lit with the same green torches. There was only one bed in the cabin, pushed in the farthest corner. Weapons, armor, and strange little relics were hung up around the bed and on the shelves. There wasn't much.

"You live here alone?" I asked Nico as we both stood around awkwardly.

"Most of the time," he admitted.

"Where are the other two?"

"What do you mean?"

"Hazel and Bianca."

A flicker of pain danced across his face. "Hazel's…somewhere else," he said stiffly. "And Bianca…" His eyes glittered wetly, and he turned his face away so I wouldn't see his weakness. He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't need to.

"I'm sorry."

He glanced up. "What?"

"I'm sorry," I repeated. "I didn't know."

He found a sudden interest in his shoes. "'Sall right."

We stood in a stony, awkward silence for what was probably a couple minutes but actually felt like hours, until we heard a strange scraping noise outside. Nico cracked open the door to see what was going on. Then he closed it and said to me, "Someone's here for you."

_Wonder who,_ I mused to myself. Nico stepped back and I opened the door. A curly-haired boy of about fifteen or sixteen was standing there, grinning as if he had just consumed a gallon of coffee. "Anybody order a bed?" he asked.

"That'd be me," I replied.

"All right then," he said. "Jason! Butch! Bring 'er in!"

He stepped aside to reveal a very strange sight. Two teens were together carrying a carved wooden bed, complete with the mattress and pillows and quilt. The younger teen was about the same age as the curly-haired kid, and had blond hair and electric blue eyes. Somehow, I thought that he looked kind of familiar, but I didn't think much of it. The older and definitely larger teen was bulky and bald, with a hard face and, surprisingly, a rainbow tattoo on his enormous bicep. I couldn't keep my eyes from drifting to the tattoo occasionally as the two boys carried the bed through the double doors and into the cabin. Nico, I noticed, started shrinking into the shadows. Almost…almost as if he didn't want to be seen by them.

The curly-haired boy appeared next to me. "They lost a bet," he explained to me. "Where do you want it?"

"Other corner," I said shortly, gesturing with my chin to the corner opposite Nico's.

"I'm Leo," said the curly-haired boy, sticking his hand out in a handshake. I didn't take it. "Never seen you around here."

I shrugged and said nothing. I wasn't being antisocial –– although that had been a large part of it. I had kind of lied when I told Nico that the shadow travel only made me a little tired. I was downright exhausted, whether it was from the actual shadow travel or all of the day's events I did not know. I wished that the two teens moving my bed would just hurry up and leave.

"So you're Nico's sis," he continued awkwardly, shoving his hand back in his pocket. "Never knew Hades had another girl."

I shrugged again. In the corner, Leo's two henchmen released my bed with loud, exhausted "whoof"s. "Next time, Valdez," panted the blond-haired boy, pointing a finger at Leo. He didn't finish.

Leo grinned, which made me want to check my pockets to see if anything was missing. Then his nose scrunched up, and he sniffed the air. "Is that…Hawaiian Punch?"

I frowned. "No. It's monster repellent."

He raised an eyebrow. "Is that sarcasm I hear?"

"No. Now get out of my cabin."

I escorted the three boys out, careful not to touch the two sweaty ones. When I shut the repoussed silver doors behind them, I sighed. Nico stepped out of the shadows, and I glanced at him.

"What was with that?" I asked, making my way over to the bed.

"What?" he replied, evading the question.

"That. Not talking to them. You acted like you were…scared of them."

He didn't meet my gaze. "I…" he hesitated. "It's complicated. Never mind."

I yawned and dropped onto the bed, letting my staff and backpack fall to the floor. It was only then that I noticed how the white-quilted bed stood out from the rest of the dark room. I didn't really care. Just so long as it was a place to sleep. It had been a while since I had slept in such a comfortable bed, and this one beat any of the others. "Whatever. I'll grill you in the…_yawn_…morning. Shadow travel… really…"

I didn't even get to finish the sentence before I dropped off to sleep, right on top of the quilt. And after a few hours of deep sleep, the dreams started penetrating through my subconsciousness.

They weren't really dreams, only glimpses of things I'd seen. Nico's face was prominent among them, even though I had only met him a little more than an hour ago. Then I saw Leo.

_"So you're Nico's sis,"_ he had said. _"Never knew Hades had another girl."_

And then I sat bolt upright, wide awake. "I'm in the wrong cabin!" I shouted. "My father is Thanatos!"

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**Ha ha, evil cliffy...**

**Or so I hope because maybe it's not so evil. I'm not sure.**

**Read, review, and recycle (by "recycle" I mean "favorite" so that visitors to your profile will see mine, hence the cycle part). Please. Pretty please review. I will be ultra happy if I get one.**

**Please review. Please review. Please review. Pretty please with sugar on top. As of posting this on May the 22, 2013, I have zero reviews and am sad. Even if you have nothing to say, review so that I know that you're there and waiting. I don't care if you favorite or follow me (though I will appreciate it...). Just review. I'm impatient.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Six reviews? AAAAAHHHSUUUUUM! *does happy dance* Yay! Keep 'm comin'! I LOVE REVIEWS! (I'm pathetic)**

**And dear anonymous guest reviewer: OF COURSE there is no cabin for Thanatos. But you have a good point. That might be another interesting plotline, how Nico deals with the pressure of having Saige in his cabin for not only this uncomfortable night but the rest of her camperhood. Just keep reading, just keep reading… *insert my trademark grin***

**Here's a nice long one for all you lovely readers... *insert suspiciously innocent smile***

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**Chapter 3**

**I Freeze a Centaur, Several Dozen Demigods, a Forest of Nymphs, and the God of Diet Coke**

Of course. Of course. Of course. Leo had been the first one to directly say a name, and I had missed it because I was so thrice-blasted tired. Nico had never said exactly who his father was. I'd never said exactly who my father was. We'd just assumed… and now it all made more sense. He had thought that I was a daughter of Hades because he and the other girls had also been hidden. I had thought that he was a son of Thanatos because of that rule –– which had apparently been revoked –– that said the Big Three couldn't have kids.

Across the room, Nico sat up in his bed and eyed me curiously. "Could you at least give me a warning before you start screaming like that?"

"I'm in the wrong cabin," I said again, still somewhat dazed.

The cynical expression on Nico's face was wiped away. "What?"

"You're a son of Hades."

"Well…yeah. You're my half sister…aren't you?"

"My father is Thanatos," I repeated flatly.

Nico's mouth opened slightly. "That's…that's not true," he stammered. "Thanatos has no children. He never had, never will."

"Well, he does now," I said.

"Are you sure?" he asked, leaping lithely out of bed and crouching next to mine on silent bare feet. "How do you know? It could just be a mistake –– "

"No. I've met him. I know him. He knows I'm his daughter. We've both known, ever since Mom died." I took a deep breath and hugged my legs against my chest. My shoes were gone, and I had been underneath the covers. Nico must have taken off my shoes and tucked me in. "You never said who your father was."

He was silent for a few moments, then he said, "You're right. I didn't."

"And I never said who mine was." It all made sense now, or at least, better sense than it had before. Nico had briefly mentioned something about keeping me hidden, and how he, Hazel, and Bianca had been the "only ones". He must have meant children of Hades. I could faintly recall Thanatos telling me about one of the gods' laws that said that the Big Three couldn't have demigod kids anymore, or something. That must have been what he was talking about.

However, there had never been a law saying that Thanatos couldn't have children.

A daughter, in particular.

Taking a few deep breaths, I closed my eyes. Then I opened them, and glanced at my watch. It was a nice watch, made of silver and enchanted to tell the exact time in whatever time zone it was in. I had stolen it from a Hunter of Artemis once when she had the misfortune to meet me. The little silver hands –– which were shaped like tiny arrows –– said that it was five thirty in the morning. Too early to get up, and too late to go back to sleep. And besides, I didn't like the idea of sleeping in the same cabin as an untrustworthy-looking boy who had just found out that I wasn't his half sister. You could never be too careful.

"When's breakfast?" I asked.

"Sometime around eight, I think. Why?"

"Just hungry."

"I could pick something up for you from the camp store, if you want…"

"That'd be great."

He stood up, shoved on his black boots, slipped his battered aviator's jacket over his black t-shirt, and went to leave, but then he turned around and asked, "Any requests?"

I managed a faint, sly smile. "Surprise me. I'll eat anything."

Something, maybe his uncomfortable stance, maybe the flicker of doubt on his face, told me that he wasn't joked with like this very often. As he ghosted out the carved silver doors of the cabin and into the night, I started to wonder what the kid had been through. Probably the same thing I had, I supposed. The horrifying revelation that I was a demigod, the psychological trauma of finding my father and who he was, and abandonment. I couldn't blame Nico. He'd gone through a lot more than I had, I could tell. His eyes told it, the sharp little movements he made when startled told it, his aloof attitude told it –– and at the same time, tried to hide it.

A bit of one of our previous conversations drifted back to me. _"What was with that?" _I had asked.

_"What?"_ he had replied.

_"That. Not talking to them. You acted like you were…scared of them."_

_"I…It's complicated. Never mind." _He didn't meet my gaze that time, and at the time I had thought nothing of it. But now, looking back on the event, I knew why. (I didn't know how; sometimes my memory could be more reliable than the things my frontal lobes had just comprehended. Other times it was the other way around. Either way, it never seemed to work in my favor.) Nico had been afraid. He wasn't just afraid of them; he was afraid of me. Afraid that I'd tell his secret, maybe? But if he was scared that I'd tell a secret, why didn't I know what that secret was in the first place? I had the pieces of the puzzle, but they were all mixed up. Nico being scared of one or two or all of the boys. The blond boy looking familiar. The brief mentions of Hazel… and how she was somewhere else. Why he was shadow traveling to California. They all went together, I just knew it. But how? And what picture did it form?

And at that moment, the boy in question entered the room. When he closed the door, I noticed briefly, he locked it. I would have laughed if I myself wasn't so paranoid. Back in my Manhattan apartment, I had self-installed three dead bolts on my front door.

He had a plastic bag in his hands. Judging solely by the shapes of the bulges in the plastic, I reasoned what he had gotten and said, "Yum. I love M&Ms." He glanced at me once and gave what might have passed as a wan smile, but it was gone almost as soon as it came. When he dropped the bag on my bed, I found that yes, I was right, it was full of candy. There were two cans of soda, one of them Dr. Pepper and the other one Diet Coke. I grabbed the Dr. Pepper, a pack of gummy bears, and two M&M bags. Nico kicked off his shoes, shrugged off his jacket, and sat on the edge of my bed, glancing at me questioningly before he did so. We ate in contented silence before I broke the silence and asked, "What was with that?"

"What?" He was evading the question again.

"Last night. With the three boys."

He averted his eyes again and started fiddling with the silver skull ring on his finger. "Nothing."

I wasn't sure how to top that, so after a few more minutes of silence, I changed the subject. "So what are we going to do?"

He glanced up and met my calm gaze. "What?"

"About me. Now that we know we're not siblings. Am I going to go into a different cabin?"

He hesitated, then nodded. "Probably. There's no cabin for Thanatos yet, because you're his first child. Since you're the first, you'll get to build one for yourself."

I started looking around the Hades cabin for inspiration. "Hmm…maybe replace the green torches with gold ones…Dad likes gold…lava lamps are cool…definitely lighten up a bit on the gargoyles…the skulls are fine, but gargoyles remind me of clowns, and clowns are freaky…" I hadn't really noticed that I was muttering to myself until Nico let out a short bark of laughter. "What?" I said, turning to him.

He was hiding his mouth behind his hand. "You're scared of clowns?" I couldn't see his mouth, but I could literally hear him smiling.

"Well yeah, why not?" I might have been scared of clowns, but I wasn't scared to admit it.

"Nothing." He turned away to sneeze.

"That was a horrible fake sneeze. Don't try to cover up the fact that you're laughing at me." I somehow managed to keep myself perfectly poker-faced as I said it.

"It's just…" He sneezed again, although this time it might have passed for a cough. "Sorry."

"It's not nice to laugh at other people's fears."

"It's not just you."

"What?"

"I'm scared of clowns too."

My jaw dropped. "What –– " To me, it didn't make much sense. Nico di Angelo, the great and powerful son of Hades, was scared of clowns. But then again, it probably didn't make much sense to him either. Saige Thanem, the great and powerful daughter of Thanatos, shared his fear. "Nuh uh!" I laughed.

Nico's pale cheeks went pink, and I wondered if he instantly regretted admitting it. "Uh huh."

"You're joking."

"No."

"You're teasing me!"

"I'm serious. Now, every time I open the door, I'm going to freak out. Thanks."

The irony was so funny, I couldn't help but laugh. And before long, Nico was joining me.

I could tell, just by the way he spoke with me, that this was the first time in a very long time that he had ever opened up to people. I'm not sure how I could read him so easily. Maybe it was because we had so much in common. This wasn't just _his _first time opening up to people. I hadn't talked to anybody in three years without drawing a weapon first. It felt odd and strangely comforting, and I somehow knew that he felt it too. Neither of us were sure why we clicked, or why we just immediately warmed up to each other. Well, _immediately _being a loose term in both context and definition. Perhaps_ after a few minutes of cold hostility_ would work better.

The joy lasted only a short time, because a few seconds later, there was a knock on the door. Nico froze and immediately stopped laughing. As silently as a wraith, he slipped off the bed and moved to the door. Subtly, I reached for my staff, which had been propped up against the wall within easy reach. Nico stood on his tiptoes and peered through an almost invisible spy hole in the door, then turned around to me and mouthed the word, _"Safe."_ I nodded, and he opened the door.

A small group of demigods in pajamas was standing there, all of them looking very ticked off, as if they'd just gotten out of bed. "What are you guys doing up at such an early hour?" I think I was the only one who heard the faint trace of mischief in Nico's voice as he said it.

The leader of the group, a girl of about fifteen, scowled. "Cabin fourteen says to shut up and go to bed. What in the Greek blazes are you doing in there, anyway?"

His face was turned away from me, but I could bet that he was rolling his eyes. These eyes must have narrowed when he saw the gaping mouth of the girl, who was staring at something right behind him. Me.

"A daughter of Hades," she whispered.

I smirked. "Now where is everyone getting that bloody idea?"

Her brow furrowed. "You mean you're not a daughter of –– "

"Thanatos," I finished shortly, leaping off the bed and twirling my staff leisurely. "You'll hear more about it later, trust me."

"Then why are you in Nico's cabin?" This question did not come from the girl, but a lanky boy next to her.

In perfect unison, Nico and I rolled our eyes. "A misunderstanding," I said.

"Now out," finished Nico as he shut the door on the ticked-off campers.

We glanced at each other once. "Who were they?" I asked.

"Children of Hecate," he explained briefly. "And they're right. I don't even know what we were doing."

"I don't either," I lied, moving awkwardly away and towards my bed. Neither of us spoke for a very long time. Eventually I just pulled out my journal and a pen and started writing, leaving Nico to his own devices. When he thought I wasn't looking, he started moving quietly and subtly around the cabin, straightening up the place. When he met my gaze, he turned away again before replying.

"Cabin inspection in the morning," he said abruptly. "You might want to clean up your place too."

He didn't add the rest, but I could guess what went there: _even though you'll be leaving._

So I did. I didn't have much; just my backpack, my staff, and a Stygian iron dagger I always kept hidden under my jacket sleeve. After I finished cleaning up my place, I took the dagger out and began cleaning my nails. Nico noticed but said nothing.

At eight o'clock, Nico took me out to the dining pavilion for breakfast. It was like nothing I'd ever seen before. Dozens of kids –– scratch that, _demigods_ were sitting at different tables, talking and laughing. Just sitting there. Not killing or trying to kill each other. It was amazing. Nico and I took plates and glasses, then we sat down together at an empty table in the corner. Even after our feast of stolen candy, I was still very hungry, and looked around for the buffet.

"We don't do things like that," explained Nico. "The nymphs'll come around with the food soon."

"They better," I said.

And they did, with huge platters of food that everyone freely chose from. I selected chocolate chip pancakes, a frosted cinnamon bun, and a sliced banana. Nico only took two waffles. I was about to dig in when he placed one cold hand on mine and lowered my fork for me. "Not yet. We have to give the offering."

He stood up with his plate and started making his way over to the central fire. In silent agreement, I followed him. The campers were each tossing a portion of their meals into the fire, and at first I thought, _What a waste._ Nico tossed in one of his waffles, leaving only one for himself. "Hades," he said. Then I remembered dimly that the gods liked offerings, and when it was my turn, threw in a chocolate chip pancake. "Thanatos."

The kid behind me gasped when I said the name, but when I turned around and met his gaze he found a sudden fascination with his shoes.

We returned to table thirteen, and I immediately started to chow down. It'd been a while since I'd eaten a full meal, and even if this was only breakfast it was the best thing I'd ever eaten. When I finally came up for air, I reflexively reached for my cup and found it empty. The nymphs hadn't come around with drinks, and I glanced at Nico inquiringly. He was innocently sipping a glass of orange juice.

"Where'd you get that?" I asked.

"The glass," he replied. "Just tell it what you want."

He later told me that the look I was giving him very much resembled that of a child of Aphrodite who saw someone wearing a pair of turquoise bell bottoms. His black eyes, if they ever could be, were completely honest, and his face was guileless. But I had met Hades before, and if the saying is correct then the apple does not fall far from the tree. He was a pretty good liar.

I stopped a passing camper, a tall teenage girl with long blond hair. "What's up?" she asked, then she seemed to recognize who I was sitting with and what table I was sitting at. "Wait a second, are you –– "

"Not his sister," I interrupted. Her gray eyes narrowed, and I added, "It's just a temporary measure. Anywho…Nico here was telling me about these wonderful little glasses." For emphasis, I held my empty one up.

Her brow furrowed, then her face cleared and she said, "Oh, right. You're new, correct? Yeah, it's cool. All you have to do is look at it and say what kind of drink you want."

Nico gave me a look that was like, _Told you._ I glared at him once before looking at the glass cup and saying, "Milk."

Immediately the cup filled to the brim with the cool white liquid. I thought about it for a few moments, then said again, "Scratch that. Whole milk."

There was no visible change, but when I took a sip I tasted the wonderful creaminess of it all. I set the glass back down, stared at it, and said, "Scratch that. Whole milk with Nesquik chocolate mix."

The milk turned a nice shade of brown. The older girl, who was watching over my shoulder, gave a breathy laugh. "Don't change it too much, otherwise bad things happen."

I didn't need a translation of the phrase "bad things". "Thanks," I said to the girl.

"No problem," she replied, striding off towards table six.

As I sipped my delectable chocolatey mixture, Nico gave me a hurt look. "You don't trust me."

"Of course not," I replied without hesitation.

His face cleared as he considered this. "It's a good policy."

After we and most of the other campers finished our meals, the horse dude –– what was his name? Chiron? –– stomped his hoof to get our attention, and immediately all noise quieted. A chubby guy in a purple Hawaiian shirt stood up and set down his Coke can, and I cringed when I recognized him. Dionysus. The same god who had wanted to turn me into a dolphin on my last visit to the camp. Oh joy.

"I suppose I should say hello to all you small wackadoodles," Dionysus sighed in the voice of someone who was being forced to say something he could care less about. "So hello. We had a new addition to Camp Half-Blood since dinner last night. Sarah Tharen."

"Saige Thanem," I corrected, standing up from my seat. A low ripple of murmurs swept throughout the pavilion, and Dionysus's bloodshot violet eyes swung to me.

"Is there anything you would like to say to me, girl?" he snapped, his pudgy fists balling.

"Saige!" Chiron barked. Then, turning to the angry wine god, he said, "Forgive our new daughter of Hades, she's a bit –– "

No one heard anything after _Hades._ The room exploded into shouts of surprise and loud gasps. Every eye was on me, except for the ones that were locked on a red-faced Dionysus. Nico slunk back into the shadows. The people who had heard about my real parentage started arguing. Some people started shouting at me directly.

So, flustered beyond self-control, I did the only thing I could do in the circumstances. I twirled my staff so the amethyst tip pointed down, raised it high in the air, and slammed the point into the marble floor.

As if someone had hit the pause button, every single noise, and I mean _every _noise, was immediately silenced. No one had been spared from the enormous freezing blast of my staff, not Nico, not the wood nymphs, not Chiron, not even Dionysus. They were unharmed, but all as still as statues, locked in the exact positions they had been when I slammed the amethyst tip into the ground. I glanced around, satisfied with my handiwork.

I reveled in the silence for a few minutes, then I sighed as I realized that I may have to soon reverse these quite satisfying results. So I made my way over to the exact spot where I had slammed down my staff, which was easy to find due to the black scorch marks and streaks of ash that spread in a three meter radius from the small spot. I twirled my staff amethyst end up, with the reversal base facing downwards. In the same way I had before, I lifted the staff and slammed it down into the marble floor.

Everyone was released from the freezing spell with a cohesive gasp. All eyes immediately swung to me, and I only shrugged and twirled my staff.

"Where was I?" I asked in the stony silence. "Oh yes. You say I am a daughter of Hades. Correction: Thanatos. Long story short, it was a misunderstanding on both of our parts. Chiron, I'll have to speak to you later about constructing a new cabin."

The centaur, who was cocking his head as if one ear had gone deaf –– there were occasionally some unpleasant yet temporary side affects of the freezings –– said, "Er…yes. I suppose. We will have a council of cabin leaders after breakfast, promptly at nine to discuss this…highly unusual addition to our camp."

Dionysus looked like he was about to blow a gasket. But he said nothing and only vanished with a popping noise that sounded like an opening soda can.

* * *

After breakfast, Nico and I made our way over to the rec room, where he said we would have the council. In the bathrooms I had straightened up a bit, actually bothering to brush out my shoulder-length dark brown hair before putting it back up and exchanging my ratty, torn jeans for a pair that a very nice daughter of Aphrodite lent me. I appreciated her help, but I couldn't help but feel annoyed when she had glanced at Nico, grinned mischievously, leaned in, and whispered into my ear, "It'll be worth it. He so likes you." I had only scowled.

But right as we were about to walk through the doors of the rec room, Nico froze in the doorway. His face went a few shades whiter, then he bolted. "Hey!" I cried indignantly. "Where'ya going?"

I found him behind a nearby oak tree. "What in Hades is wrong with you?" I snapped. He didn't reply, only sank down to the ground with his hands covering his face. This probably wasn't the time to get mad at him, and my furious expression softened.

"I can't go in there," he said in a small voice that was almost a whisper.

"Why not?" I asked, kneeling next to him.

"He's there. I forgot that he would come."

I tried to figure out for myself who "he" was by mentally scrolling through the list of people I had seen seated around the Ping-Pong table. Chiron and Dionysus, of course. The tall blond girl from the breakfast pavilion had been there. Two older boys with mischievous grins were there, whom I'd never seen before. That bulky kid with the rainbow tattoo was there. A shouting girl with hair that looked like it had been styled by sugar-high squirrels with safety scissors was there. The daughter of Aphrodite who had lent me a pair of jeans was there, sitting next to a muscular boy with blond hair. The same boy who had helped bring me my bed.

And at that moment, I realized why he'd looked familiar.

It was like all the puzzle pieces had just clicked into place, and now I was staring at an image that I wasn't particularly eager to see. The brief mentions of Hazel, and how she was at another place. Nico's fear of that certain blue-eyed boy. Why he had been traveling to California. The rumors at the other camp. My mouth opened, but then the gape turned into a grin.

"You're scared of being seen by Jason," I said. "You've been to Camp Jupiter, haven't you?"

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**Another evil cliffy. I'm telling you, I love these things. (Sorry, iz2lazy2loginhah! *cringes* Please don't kill me, please don't kill me…)**


	4. Chapter 4

**Hello there my lovely readers, just to let you know, I am still among the living. Sorry for the two-day hiatus! Believe me, it pained me more than it pained you!**

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**Chapter 4**

**I Get to Whack Somebody (yay!)**

For a few moments, Nico acted like the surprised one. "You…you too?"

"What do you mean, 'you too'?" I snapped. "What do you think?"

Nico hesitated. "I mean…it's just such a surprise. Father told me I was the only one who knew about both camps…it's just…how did you find out?"

I stared at him in exasperation. "Secrets can't be kept forever. Especially from nosy people who know how to shadow travel."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"You never asked."

He stared at his palms, not saying anything for quite a while. Then, after a long pause, he said, "If you've been to the other camp, he'll recognize you too."

I considered this. "Yes. But last time I was there, he wasn't. Now I know why."

"What about any of the times before that?"

"The time before that…hey, I've only been there twice. Sure, I've seen him, but I don't think he's ever seen me. And if he did, he forgot about me, just like everybody else."

Nico sighed, as if saying, _what am I going to do?_ "He knows me personally. Back at the other camp, we talked when I first arrived. Now that he has his memories back, I can't show my face to him. He'll recognize me, and then there'll be trouble."

"So what are we going to do about it?"

"I can't go to the meeting. You can go alone."

"You were the one who brought me here. It's kind of required that you go."

We sat in this stalemate for a few minutes, thinking this over. Then I said, "You're going. I'm going to make you, even if I have to use my freezer."

He looked up at me, real fear showing in those usually impregnable dark eyes. "What?" I noticed his right hand drifting to his boot, and noticed the faint glimmer of a Stygian iron knife handle inside.

I grinned. "It's like my mom used to say –– we're making this way too hard for ourselves by assuming that we have to avoid the rats every time we see one. All we need to do is get rid of the nest."

* * *

I walked into the rec room with my staff resting against my shoulder. People turned to look at me, and the room instantly grew quiet. I raised an eyebrow as I scrutinized the people seated around the Ping-Pong Table. A girl, one of the Demeter kids I saw last night, was planting flowers in the hair of a sleeping boy. Another girl, the one from the Hecate cabin who I'd met that morning, was twirling and flipping a drachma in impossible coin tricks. A couple of kids were squirting Cheez Whiz into their mouths, and froze when I walked in the room.

"Jason?" I inquired clearly, my voice sounding very high-pitched in the silence. "Can I talk to you for a couple seconds?"

All eyes swung to the blond-haired boy. His face screwed into mild confusion. "Why?"

"Oh, just something really quick," I said. "One of the cabin leaders can't come, and I was hoping that you'd be able to help him."

He stood up and smiled faintly. "I…don't know how I can help, but…okay."

Someone in the back of the room suggested, "Maybe someone needs electroshock therapy." Jason and I ignored him and the snickers that followed. The son of Zeus (or would that be Jupiter?) followed me out the door, waving to the brown-haired daughter of Aphrodite as he went. I led him into the woods, behind the very same tree Nico and I had been hiding behind. When we were alone except for the dryads, he asked, "What's wrong?"

I breathed deeply. "It's the leader of the Hades cabin," I said. "Actually, the only kid in the Hades cabin."

Jason's eyebrow went up. "Who?"

"He brought me here last night," I explained, "and at first thought I was his sister, so he kind of has to go to this meeting."

"So why isn't he going?"

I took a deep breath. "He doesn't want to be seen by you."

Jason's blue eyes widened, and his mouth opened, but whatever he was about to say was lost forever. Because at that moment, my staff, which I had slung over my shoulder like a rifle, twirled and smashed into his forehead. His eyes rolled back, and he collapsed on the ground like a sack of potatoes. For good measure, I touched him with the crystal tip, sending a small strain of the staff's memory-wiping magic into his system.

From his perch in the tree, Nico climbed down and stared at the unconscious Jason. "Remind me not to get on your bad side."

"He won't remember a thing that happened in the past five minutes," I assured him. "Normally, after a hit like that, he wouldn't wake up for a quarter hour or so. But until then…"

Nico later told me that I had on "the grin". Oh, "the grin". The one that usually suggested that I was about to do something very, very bad.

* * *

"He's so peaceful when he's sleeping," I whispered to Nico.

We'd taken Jason to the Hypnos cabin, placed him in a bed, and covered him with a blanket. With the dim lights and serene environment, there was no way he'd be coming out soon.

"When he wakes up, he'll just fall asleep again," replied Nico in the same whispering voice. At this, I gave "the grin" again.

"He won't even know how he got here," I said as we exited quietly.

* * *

The council of cabin leaders went as normal –– or as normal as I supposed it was supposed to go, because I had never been present for one. The cabin leader for Aphrodite, whose name I learned was Piper, brought up the subject of Jason, and all eyes swung to me. I only shrugged.

"He said he'd be back," I said. "Went in, didn't come out."

"Where?" asked the blond girl, who I later learned was the cabin leader for Athena and whose name was Annabeth.

I shrugged. "We were passing by this one little cinderblock building with two doors, and he said 'I'll be right back' and _didn't_…" Further elaboration was unnecessary. Annabeth raised an eyebrow. Piper flushed a deep red. A few of the boys snickered.

"Oh," said Annabeth.

"Yeah," I replied, nodding. "I didn't want to lean in and shout, so I didn't."

So other than that one tiny deviation, we mostly stayed on subject. The subject in question wasn't very fascinating itself, mostly dealing with the subject of where to put my cabin. Well, that was kind of easy. It would be cabin twenty-nine, on the left side of the second wing. I, being the first and probably only, would design it. And then came the doubting moment, when that suddenly very annoying daughter of Athena decided to speak up, and deviate from the subject again.

"But how do we know she's actually a daughter of Thanatos?" she asked. At this, I glared at her, but she either didn't see or was ignoring me. "She hasn't been claimed publicly. How do we know for sure?"

"You don't," I replied shortly, casually propping my foot up on the edge of the Ping-Pong table as I swung my staff over my shoulder. "You take my word for it. Trust me. I've seen him, I've met him, I even punched him in the nose once. I know who my father is, Wise Girl."

Annabeth visibly cringed. Everybody else was staring at me as if I had just crossed a line that I probably shouldn't have. "What did you just call me?" Her small voice shook.

I was confused and mildly annoyed. "What did I say wrong?"

Nico tapped my shoulder lightly to get my attention, and when my gaze was on him, he shook his head in warning. "What?" I asked.

"That's…not the best tactic," he advised quietly. "Calling Annabeth Wise Girl… don't go there."

I wasn't the daughter of wisdom. So I asked, "Why not?"

He hesitated, inhaled, and then shook his head. He mouthed the words, "I'll tell you later", and I nodded subtly.

Annabeth's hands now covered her eyes, and her shoulders were shaking. Some of the other campers were comforting her, others were glaring at me, and still others did both. "Seriously, what did I do?" I asked.

Annabeth looked up. Her gray eyes were glassy and wet, and she couldn't hide the pain in them. "You didn't know," she choked. "I'm sorry."

"For what?" I inquired. This entire ordeal was giving me a serious headache.

Annabeth shrugged helplessly. "You didn't know," she repeated softly, "about Percy."

I was quiet. I felt very awkward (as if I never did), and extremely stupid for something that I was still oblivious about. I was saved from this uncomfortable and frankly familiar mixture of feelings by the least likely of people, who at that moment just walked through the door.

"I suppose this is probably not the best time to intrude," said Thanatos casually, "but I believe I have a daughter who needs picking up?"

* * *

**So, another cliffy! Thank you for hating me!**

**Quick question –– while Saige is building her cabin (which she inevitably will; no spoilers there) do the readers want her to sleep in Nico's cabin, or should she just automatically go into the Hermes cabin? I think I already know the answer to that one, but because I'm lazy and reluctant to change the one that I do already have, I'm asking just in case. Review or PM and tell me!**

**Review please! Pretty please! Pretty please with a cherry on top! I love your reviews! PLEEEEEEEZE review! ._.**

**pwease?**


	5. Chapter 5

**Allo!**

**Me again!**

**I couldn't wait!**

**My precious three votes are in… yup, just what I thought. Keep reading to find out results :P**

**Thank you, AndiCrossDaughterofNeptune! Very good point (laughs) You'll see it… don't ask what because I think you know…**

**And so here it is! Your beloved chapter 5! If I got anything wrong please tell me!**

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**Chapter 5**

**Death Comes To Claim Me**

Most people stared. Nico got to his knees. I just said, "Hey, Dad."

Thanatos was standing in the doorway as if he'd just appeared there out of the shadows –– he probably had. If you ignored our identical, piercing gold eyes and our smooth dark hair, you would doubt that this tall, handsome, extremely hunky, Indian-looking guy with the awesome rainbowy wings was the father of the small, skinny white girl with the staff that was taller than she was. I wasn't sure what a regular father looked like, but even still I knew that most dads (1) weren't incredibly hot, (2) didn't wear black chitons with flowing capes, (3) did not have wings, and (4) did not carry Stygian iron scythes.

In other words, just my dad.

Following Nico, everyone else bowed too, except for Chiron, who just lowered his head, and Dionysus, who just looked annoyed. I didn't move. I'd never bowed to my dad. We'd settled into a kind of casual indifference for each other –– him tolerating me, me tolerating him (more of the former, because contrary to common belief, Death is forgiving).

I stepped forward, and in a "whispering" voice that I knew everyone could hear, I hissed, "What are you doing here?" I sounded like an annoyed teen whose _mortal _dad had arrived during a wild party to pick her up before her bedtime.

He looked down at me and locked my gaze. I didn't flinch. "I'm claiming you."

The other demigods were getting to their feet awkwardly. "Lord Thanatos," said Chiron uncomfortably, not meeting my dad's gaze, "it is highly…um, unconventional for the child's parent to –– "

"Chiron," said Thanatos, turning his golden gaze towards the centaur, "does it look like I care?"

Chiron furrowed his brow but said nothing.

"Exactly." My dad nodded crisply. "So, even though it is supposedly 'unconventional', I claim this girl, Saige Thanem, as my daughter. Blah blah blah, let her have her own cabin, show her disrespect and I will show you the Doors. And I think we all know _which_ Doors. We are done here."

He turned to go, but then he seemed to remember something and turned around. "And you," he said, pointing to Nico. Nico's eyes widened at the sudden attention, and Thanatos smiled ominously at his discomfort. "Stay away from my daughter."

And then, with a dramatic swirl of his black cape, Thanatos was gone.

* * *

Needless to say, no one doubted my parentage after that.

At first, people stared. But over time, they started to accept the fact that one of the known bachelor gods had finally fallen off the wagon, the product being me. Sure, I still looked out of place with my uncanny gold eyes, pale skin, and dark clothes, but who cared? And soon the only stares came when I did something else stupid, like trip over a flat surface or accidentally freeze a naiad after dropping my staff in the lake.

Immediately after Dad left, I was burdened with the task of designing my own cabin. Annabeth, who had forgiven me for the "Wise Girl" remark and was apparently an architect, helped me design with this awesome laptop with a really cool blueprint app. I was using the Hades cabin as a loose example, except that the Thanatos cabin would be a bit taller and... I guess you would say, more regal. The walls, pillars, and floors would be silver-streaked black marble, and the double doors would be gilded with gold and studded with dark violet stones. In place of green torches, I made them gold, and in my personal corner I had lava lamps instead. Gold, purple, black, and silver. Strange combo, but it worked surprisingly well.

Of course, I didn't use any gargoyles in the designs.

I got my own table in the dining pavilion. Table twenty-nine, yay…! Um, no. Over the years I had gotten used to always being alone, but that one night with Nico and that one meal at his table had rekindled that thirst for companionship inside me. Personally, I hated the feeling. I was later told that it was called "loneliness".

Jason staggered drowsily out of the Hypnos cabin sometime during the late afternoon without remembering how he'd gotten there. Last he remembered, he had been talking with his girlfriend Piper and next moment, he'd found himself in the most comfortable bed in the world.

Nico and I said nothing about it.

And obviously, Nico avoided the still-drowsy Jason the next few days.

Also during those next few days, Nico guided me around Camp Half-Blood as I got used to the routine, because even though my dad had said "hands off", he was one of the few people who I could outright talk to without one of us stomping off. The other few, Piper, Annabeth, a daughter of Ares named Clarisse, and two twin sons of Hermes named Travis and Conner, had schedules and still barely tolerated me. Nico and I sparred against each other for a while during weapons practice, and, surprisingly, I won the majority of the times. All I had needed was my staff and my Stygian iron dagger, no swords involved.

Unfortunately, I had to use the reversal base of my staff several times on various victims, which included Nico. I wasn't used to being around so many other people and even my arrogance couldn't hide the fact that I was just plain clumsy.

Nico mostly tried to avoid me (thanks, Dad) but, when I was constructing my cabin, helped me out by summoning some undead builders who finished it perfectly and in less than three days.

The kids of the Hermes cabin offered to take me in while my cabin was still under construction during the aforementioned three days. I was touched by their willingness until Nico told me privately that if the Stoll brothers, Travis and Conner, got their hands on my freezer… things could get messy. I didn't need a translation of "messy". So instead, I politely told them that no, I would be staying in cabin thirteen until my own was completed. Yes, I knew it would be awkward for both of us. Yes, people would get suspicious. Yes, I was right with both predictions, and I can't count how many times Chiron offered to put up a barrier between my bed and Nico's before I finally gave in just to make the centaur stop annoying me.

Hence, Nico could not stay away from me. I promised him, "If my father finds out, I will take full responsibility."

He stuck his tongue out at me. "You never take responsibility."

I considered this, then nodded. "Very true. But if he finds out, I'll break that record for you."

Once it was finished, I got a good night's sleep in my new cabin. I had gotten a new bed, which matched the décor with its black frame, dark violet quilt, and black furry pillows.

But I think I might need to say that at dinner on my fifth night at Camp Half-Blood, when I glanced over to table thirteen as I was eating my hamburger, I noticed that Nico wasn't there.

I might also need to say that when I checked, he wasn't even in his cabin.

And I definitely might also need to say that, because of the cursed dream that showed me where he had gone, I lost a lot of sleep that night.

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**Review please. Please review. Review please. Please review.**

**You know I will annoy you until you do.**

**Did I just rhyme?**

**And yes! I DO love cliffies! There's another one! ^_^**

**Next time, maybe I'll get my cover art up. It'll be way too late, seeing as I am halfway through this story already, but still...**


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: You don't have to read it, but I would highly recommend reading my other Percy Jackson fanfic, Overcoming the Tears, before reading this next chapter. Don't worry, it's a oneshot, and only about a thousand words, so it won't take long. But I'm warning you, if you don't read it, you may possibly get confused at a certain part and very possibly confused at another part…**

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**Chapter 6**

**Nico's Turn to Whack Somebody (oh boy…)**

When I had noticed that Nico wasn't at his table, nor in his cabin, I must have looked pretty down because, around the campfire that night, Annabeth actually came up to me and asked if anything was wrong.

"Nothing," I said a bit too quickly. "Nothing's wrong."

Her brow furrowed, and a small smile snaked up her lips. "Nothing," she repeated, and if a daughter of wisdom could ever sound sly, it was now. "Sure. Nothing. It's Nico, isn't it?"

I shifted my constant grip on my ever-present staff. "Yeah."

Annabeth only gave a small, helpless shrug. "Sometimes he leaves. He never really stays for long. He's more of a free spirit at heart."

I was silent for a few minutes as I listened to the Apollo kids leading the camp songs. Then I said to the older girl, "Why would he leave without telling anybody?"

That sly smile was back, but it was tinged with sadness. "I don't know, Saige," said Annabeth. "I guess he just had to go. He does that sometimes, and doesn't tell anybody. He doesn't like goodbyes."

I was pretty good at seeing through facial masks, and I could tell that under hers was a memory. A painful memory. Of someone else who left without telling her. And I was pretty sure I could figure out who.

"Who's Percy?" I asked bluntly, wishing I hadn't immediately after the words had spilled out of my mouth. I had heard the name exactly once, during the council of cabin leaders in which I had inadvertently called Annabeth "Wise Girl" and might have snapped her last string. I had asked Nico later, but I hadn't gotten much out of him except that Percy's last name was Jackson and that no one should ever call Annabeth "Wise Girl" because that was Percy's nickname for her.

The effects were similar to that of which would have occurred if I had touched her forehead with my freezer. Her gray eyes glittered, and she ducked her head and wiped them with the back of her hand. "He's my boyfriend," she said in a quiet, shaky voice. "He went missing last year."

I wasn't sure exactly how to comfort her about this. "Did he ever come back?" I almost didn't need to ask. I thought I knew already.

She shook her head, her blond hair swaying. "Jason…Jason came three days after Percy left. His memories had been stolen, and now that he has them back, he remembers another camp."

My blood froze cold in my veins. Another camp. Camp Jupiter. Nico and I weren't alone among the Greeks. I tried my best to play the ignorant child –– "What other camp?"

"Another camp for demigods," explained Annabeth, finally meeting my eyes with her red-rimmed ones. "For the Roman ones. It's…it's hard to explain, but Jason is one of those Roman demigods. Now that he remembers the camp, he thinks that Hera, the goddess who stole his memories and brought him here, also stole Percy's and took him to Camp Jupiter."

I knew about the controversy between the two camps. You couldn't just hop back and forth between them, stealing things from both sides, for three years _without _knowing. I knew how messy things could get if one demigod from each camp was switched with another. Hera must've been super bored if she thought that doing something so drastic was a good idea. Yow. No wonder Nico didn't want to show his face to Jason. And now I was in danger too. "What are you going to do about it?" I asked, trying to hide my nervousness.

Annabeth took a deep breath to calm herself, and then she started explaining their plan. It sounded crazy. I knew the Romans wouldn't appreciate a giant flying warship above their camp. But in a way, it kind of made sense, in a reckless way –– waiting until they knew for sure that Percy was there, then sending the giant flying boat over to pick him up. Apparently, they –– meaning Jason, Piper, and that Leo kid; go figure –– were part of a group of seven, from a great prophecy or something like that. Percy was another, Annabeth was potentially another one, and the last two would probably be from Camp Jupiter. They would wait until they knew for sure where Percy was and that the ship they were flying on, the _Argo II,_ was finished, and then they would go on their (suicide) mission.

When she was finished, I said what I thought. "It sounds crazy."

"It is," Annabeth agreed.

"Then why are you doing it?"

She took in another deep breath, let it out slowly, and then said, "Love makes people desperate. And I love Percy. We've known each other since we were about your age. He's saved my life; I've saved his; we've saved each other's."

"How much do you love him?"

This question, coming from someone as young as me, caught her off guard. But I knew much more than my appearance revealed, and contrary to common belief, I wasn't ignorant. "After a week of not knowing where he had gone," she continued, "I started to go crazy. I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep, I could barely even look at the color blue without breaking down into tears. I would give anything to know where he is now."

"But how much does _he _love _you?"_ I made sure to use present tense.

She hesitated before replying. "The night before he went missing, we met on the beach. We kissed, and he promised that he would go to Tartarus to save me."

The words sent a chill down my spine. _Promised._ Promises could be dangerous things. They would either hold you accountable or come back to haunt you later. The word beckoned out a memory, not a complete flashback, but enough to send me to my knees.

_ "Daddy? Is Mum…" A nine-year-old girl, wearing a lavender dress, crept towards a black-suited man kneeling in front of a hospital bed. The still body of a woman lay there, her skin as pale as the sheet she was covered by._

_ The man turned to see the small, amber-eyed girl. There was a reluctant hesitation, as he tried to find the words. "I'm sorry, angel. Your mother has passed through the Doors. I am not allowed to bring her back."_

_ A silence. Then, the girl's voice, small and hollow, whispered, "You promised to heal her."_

_ "Saige, it doesn't work like that. If someone's time has come, I cannot bring them back. Not even my Diane."_

_ "But Daddy, you promised!" The child was trembling now, her small frame quaking under her flowered dress._

_ A longer, colder silence. Then the man said again, "I'm sorry, Saige, but I can't –– "_

_ "You promised!"_

With those two words ringing in my ears, I dropped to my knees. I'm not even sure how I got off the bench. My staff fell out of my hands, clattering harmlessly to the ground. Someone steadied me, I think maybe Annabeth. All around me, everything seemed as unreal as the memory; gray and blurred by tears. Somewhere in my brain, it registered that the singers were faltering and eventually stopping altogether. I think people might have been staring, but I couldn't be sure.

"Saige! What happened?" Annabeth asked, helping me to my feet.

Someone placed my staff in my hand, and I used it to support my dizzy body. I was still gasping for breath from the brief, yet alarming flashback, and only managed a weak shaking of my head.

And then everything swirled into gray, and once again I was thrust back into the past.

_I saw a grave._

_ The name inscribed on it was Diane Thanem._

_ A young girl dressed in black stood in front of it. Though only a year older, she was barely recognizable as the girl from the hospital room with her frayed clothes, thin face, skinny body, and hard eyes. It was cold and raining, but she did not seem to care. A wooden staff was slung over her shoulder with one hand, and in her other hand she held a bundle of jet-black roses. She was the only one left who cared about the woman buried below. Kneeling in the tall, overgrown grass of the lonely graveyard, she set the bundle of roses before the headstone. It was the only new one in the entire graveyard._

_ A movement in her peripheral vision caught her eye, and she looked up. There, curled up underneath a yew tree and staring right at her, was a small boy. He froze, his hand still up in its former position, brushing the long locks of raven hair out of his face. She locked eyes with him; manic gold with the impenetrable black. She wondered what a boy no older than she was would be doing out here in such a place without proper covering, for he wore nothing but sweatpants and a light jacket. Wet streaks ran down his dirty cheeks; from rain or tears she did not know. He was scared, she could tell, and his obsidian eyes reflected the brokenness of an abandoned child. It was a brokenness she was familiar with. She saw it every time she looked in a mirror._

_ She lowered her gaze back down to the grave in front of her. Two lines were inscribed underneath the name, and mentally she cursed the one who had put them there. One line had been for the dead woman, and the second had been for the abandoned daughter –– but they meant nothing to her now. Father –– no, she could not even call him that –– "You will always be my goddess," Thanatos had whispered to the dying woman on her deathbed, and the same six words he had inscribed on her grave. "Saige, although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it," he had said not long after to his motherless daughter. But the words now meant nothing. Thanatos no longer loved her mother. And he had abandoned her to the world; how was she supposed to overcome that?_

_ Without looking up, she could sense the boy's aura in the fringes of her consciousness. She could feel his fear and pain. It is true, the world is full of suffering, she mused to herself, but the question is, how can we overcome it when we have nothing left? She could sense in his aura the sorrow of a death, the shock of a revelation, and the terror of powers he could not control. She and the boy were more like each other than she at the time knew. But she knew where to turn. He was alone._

_ Impulsively, she stood up and slipped her jacket off her shoulders, leaving it behind at the grave. She strode away without looking back, and using the shadows under a streetlight as a shadow portal, she vanished._

_ The boy stared at the jacket she had left. Crawling forward, he snatched it up and slipped it over his shoulders._

And that was when I made the connection, jolting me out of the past.

Nico di Angelo, son of Hades, was the boy at the graveyard those long two years ago.

Stumbling once more, I was only saved from the ground by my staff. "Saige!" someone, I think Annabeth, cried again.

"Nico," I gasped unthinkingly. "That was –– he was –– !"

"We need a medic!" Annabeth shouted, and the sudden, loud words sent a dagger of pain between my eyes. A boy, probably a son of Apollo, rushed to my side as I was helped onto the bench, but I waved him off and stood up on my own.

"I'm –– fine," I said haltingly as my dry tongue tried to remember how to form words and my mind tried to remember how to filter out just the right ones to use. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a blond-haired teen stand up, and an alarm of panic started to ring in my mind. I could not let the name Nico di Angelo slip off my tongue and into Jason's ears. "Just –– a headache, that's all." Using my staff to balance my still unsteady legs, I started walking away from the campfire and towards my cabin. People flocked to my sides, and I waved them off. "I'll go alone. I just need to lie down, maybe just go to bed." They didn't seem to mind and just let me go.

In the dark, cool environment of my cabin, my debilitating migraine faded as I lay down in my bed. After a while, it disappeared completely, bringing the comfort of sleep. Good night, Saige, I told myself absent-mindedly as I slipped into unconsciousness, which was a nasty habit of mine.

It was everything but good.

Because of the dream.

* * *

I saw Nico, standing in a dim, cavernous room. I recognized the place. I'd been there before. He was in the Underworld, more specifically in Hades's throne room. Looking very small, Nico stood before the throne itself, which held a very ticked off Hades. I didn't see anyone else there, except for a few skeleton guards. Persephone, of course, wasn't there. She'd probably just been released to let the early spring crocuses come up. The attention deficit part of my mind thought sarcastically, _Ooh, yay. Pollen time. Let's go buy some Claratin._

The serious part of my mind whacked the ADHD part back into focus.

Nico's head drooped as he stood before his father. "Until they find out themselves, she is a threat," Hades was saying. "If she turns against you and tells them –– "

"She would never do that," blurted Nico, lifting his head and meeting his father's gaze.

Hades glared down at his son imperiously. "Don't interrupt me," he snapped. "As I was saying before you so impudently cut me off, it would lead them to you."

"But –– "

"_You_ are the one who always seems to leave. _You_ are the suspicious one. _You_ are the one nobody likes. If that girl's tongue slips, she might be held up as the hero, while you are cast out as the traitor."

"Just _listen!"_ shouted Nico, his voice echoing sharply around the room. Hades looked so stunned, and actually froze. The ghosts in the room started getting agitated. I could tell that Nico instantly regretted raising his voice to his father, but it was either regret being a coward or regret the punishment for standing up for himself. So he continued, but in a lower voice. "Saige would never turn against me. Sure, maybe when we first met she would have happily killed me, but she's not like that anymore. She's changed."

Oookaaay…so Nico left Camp Half-Blood for girl talk with his dad. I think not. There was something else going on here, and a creeping suspicion in the back of my mind hinted at what it was.

For long moments after Nico's reckless outburst, Hades was silent. He didn't seem used to his son ever standing up to him. Go Nico, I wanted to cheer. My answer as to where and how he was being abused was now clear to me. Nico's relationship with his father wasn't like me with mine. Mine was in grudging respect and sarcastic indifference, and his was in fear.

"What?" asked Hades finally in a sharp voice as cold as a shard of dry ice. Nico actually flinched, and then lowered his head again.

"I'm sorry," he said in a quavering voice, and if I had not been there simply as a dream-form I would have grabbed my staff and whacked Hades with the freezing side as hard as I could. I couldn't stand to see Nico like this. He was actually scared. "I…I didn't mean for any disrespect, Father. I'm sorry."

A mirthless smile spread up Hades's cheeks. "You are forgiven," he said. "But to prove yourself to me once again you must do what I have ordered."

Nico's shaggy black head shot up. "You don't mean –– "

"I do mean it," said Hades. "You said you are sorry. Prove how sorry you are by –– "

"No!" cried Nico, the terror ringing true in his voice.

And at this, I snapped awake.

It was only four in the morning, but I couldn't fall back asleep.

* * *

Afterwards, I tossed and turned in my bed, trying to fall asleep as my thoughts swirled in an almost incomprehensible turmoil. I knew Nico was not dead –– I could sense whenever someone I knew passed through the Doors –– but little else. The unknown would not leave me alone. Eventually, I gave up my futile attempts of sleep and took out my journal. Sitting on my bed in my cabin with my journal and my favorite gel pen, the thoughts started to flow into comprehensible sentences. And I started to write. Everything was in the form of a question.

_Why was Nico talking to his father?_

_ Why were they talking about me?_

_ Why am I a threat?_

_ Why are they worried that I'll spill the secret about both camps?_

_ Why would I be held up as a hero, and Nico cast out as a traitor?_

_ What did Hades want Nico to do?_

_ Why was Nico so scared at the prospect of whatever it was that he had to do?_

_ Does it have to do with me?_

_ Does Nico like me?_

_ Did they know I could see and hear them through the dream?_

_ Why does Hades treat Nico like that?_

_ What will happen to Nico?_

_ Will he come back?_

_ Is this connected to the flashback I had of the graveyard?_

_ Is Nico really the boy to whom I had given my jacket?_

_ Did he recognize me?_

_ If so, why did he not tell me?_

_ Does he even remember at all?_

_ If I tell him I saw him in my flashback, will he remember?_

_ If I tell him I saw him and his father in a dream, will he tell me what happened?_

_ Should I tell him that I saw what happened?_

_ What will happen if I do, and it's not true?_

_ Does he trust me?_

_ Can I trust him?_

None of them had answers.

* * *

I got some of those answers that morning.

At the beginning of breakfast, he wasn't at table thirteen. Sometime after the offering, though, I looked over and there he was, sitting in front of an empty plate. A faint purple bruise around his eye that hadn't been there before was easily visible, even though he tried to hide it with his hair. As I watched, he only sat there, not eating at all. After breakfast, he ducked away quietly, as if he didn't want to be noticed as he traveled towards the woods. So I did the obvious. I followed him. He kept walking, deeper and deeper into the forest. The shadows of the trees seemed to bend around him as he traveled through them, an effect that I had seen only once before, but with my father in place of the surprisingly small and helpless-looking boy. With his hands in his pockets and his shoulders hunched, I could almost believe that this was the same child I had seen in the old graveyard that day long ago.

He didn't see or hear me as I followed silently behind him, and soon I became tired of this. "Nico!" I called, and I swear I saw him jump a little bit at the sound of his name before turning around and recognizing me. "Where were you last night?"

He tried to meet my eyes, but he didn't pull it off in time and I immediately knew that something was up. "I was… running an errand."

I mentally marked off the hesitation and moved on to the next question. "Really? What kind of errand? Did it have to do with your father, by any chance?"

He couldn't hide his nervousness as he glanced around, as if about to tell me a secret. No one was around. Of course no one was, this deep into the forest. My instincts started to beep warning signals, and I soothed them temporarily by placing my free hand on the shaft of my ever-present staff. Nico finally met my gaze, but when he did, I was surprised to see the pain in his obsidian eyes.

"You saw us, didn't you?" he whispered.

I nodded slowly, my smirk absolutely begging for him to continue.

I couldn't have predicted what he did next. "Then there's nothing left to hide," he said reluctantly. His hand swiftly went down to his boot and drew out a Stygian iron dagger. Eyes widening, I lifted my staff, but I was too slow and the pommel of Nico's dagger smashed into my temple.

I didn't even have time to utter a curse before I crumpled to the ground.

* * *

**I know you're there. I know you're reading right now. I know you're devastated at my fifth cliffhanger since the beginning of this story. Just let me know the level of your devastation and your opinion on what should happen next. (I'm probably not going to listen to those opinions, seeing as I already have this entire thing written out, but you never know… I might just change those for you.)**

**So just REVIEW. Give an opinion. HOW IN HADES AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHAT YOU GUYS THINK ABOUT THE STORY WITH NO ONE'S OPINIONS? Contrary to common belief, I am not telepathic.**


	7. Chapter 7

**Twenty one reviews! Yayz! Pathetic compared to the fanfictions of other people, so please keep them flooding in! (I know you're there, people who haven't reviewed yet…I know you're there…your numbers are somewhere over two hundred as of the day I post this…there is no hiding from me ^_^)**

**And dear anonymous guest reviewer with the high devastation level: I seriously did not notice that I wrote that in the middle of the question list until you pointed it out. I can excuse that by saying that Saige, like most other demigods, is ADHD, and quite frankly I am a tiny bit too.**

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**Chapter 7**

**The Ghost King Suddenly Hates Me**

A throbbing headache met me when I emerged back into consciousness.

Typical.

Another thing that met me when I emerged back into consciousness –– the grinning face of a skeleton. Usually, I'm comfortable around dead people. But I'd think that even a daughter of Death himself would be a bit frightened when opening her eyes to find one six inches away from her nose. I yelped and tried scrambling back, only to crash into whoever was keeping me supported upright on my knees. That someone happened to be Nico, who was holding me up by my arms. I looked up into his eyes, smiled charmingly, and then jerked my head down to chomp his hand.

I regretted the contact between my teeth and his fingers, but I was frankly quite proud when, following in quick succession to the chomping, Nico released me. I regretted it again when I heard his scream of pain, but all regrets were dismissed when a skeleton soldier in an army fatigue came after me. My hands were shackled behind my back with handcuffs, but my fighting instincts kicked in and I leapt to my feet, using the momentum of my landing to jump again and hook my bound hands underneath my legs. With my left hand I yanked out the Stygian iron dagger hidden in a sheath under my jacket sleeve, and was prepared to fight until the skeleton soldier raised his rifle.

Needless to say, I froze.

Nico grabbed my arms from behind, took away my dagger, and forced me to my knees with the point of his sword between my shoulder blades. Now that I was no longer in fighting mode, I could see that we were now in the Underworld, in the same throne room I had seen in my dream. As before, Hades sat in the throne with his skeleton warriors flanking him. But this time, he didn't look royally ticked. He almost looked…amused.

"Bra_va,"_ said Hades sarcastically, clapping his hands slowly. "Brava. Absolutely wonderful, daughter of Thanatos."

Naturally, I had to be impudent. "What do _you _want?"

The Lord of the Underworld, and my dad's employer, stared down at me as if I was dense. Can't say he was wrong, but nevertheless his imperious attitude annoyed me. "I want you to shut up."

I let out a humorless bark of laughter. "Get in line. There are about a hundred demigods, dozens of monsters, countless mortals, one father, and twelve Olympians in front of you."

"And I think it's high time you paid for those guards and those chambers you destroyed on your last visit to my home. Do you have any idea –– "

"Just get to the point, Hades," I said.

"Point number _three,_" continued Hades, with emphasis on _three,_ "You are the only other one other than my son who knew about both camps. Now that Jason has been revealed as a Roman, the Greeks may be suspicious of anyone who also has contact with the other camp. And then, once Nico's big mouth starts talking, that suspicion would be drafted to me, and ruin my image with the big guys."

I stared slack-jawed at him. "So you sent Nico to kidnap me," I said slowly, "whack me over the head, and take me to the last place I want to go just because you don't want your image ruined? That makes _no_ sense!" I knew I probably should have respected the Lord of the Dead a bit more than I was doing –– which basically amounted to about negative thirteen on a one to ten scale of respect –– but my arrogance surpassed my fear by far. And also, I knew that Hades was averse to harming girls, especially ones that were daughters of his head lieutenant.

"If you saw us in the dream," said Hades, ignoring my impudence, "then you surely must have the pieces of the puzzle to figure it out yourself. Or would you like your _friend_ to explain it to you?"

"I have the pieces," I said coldly, craning my neck to glare up at Nico. "And I don't like how you said 'friend'. It sounded like sarcasm." I couldn't pull the glare off, and I can bet that the effort looked stupid. As did my not-so-smart comeback.

And yet Nico was still affected by it. "Look, I couldn't –– " he tried to say.

And now I did the most idiotic, Saige-like thing anyone could ever do. He was holding the blade of a sword between my shoulder blades, and I had either the nerve or the utter stupidity to cut him off. "Save it," I snapped. "I know what's going on here. Your father hates me. He wanted you to bring me to him. And because you fear him, you did what he said so I can die."

"Oh, you're not going to die," interjected Hades. "Thanatos would quit if he saw your name on SoulReaper. Even if I tried to hide the cause of your demise, he would be able to trace it back to me."

"Then what are you going to do with me?"

Hades gave a sickly sweet smile. "Oh, my girl, I think you know already."

I did. I just didn't particularly like the prospect.

* * *

Just what I thought.

Lifetime imprisonment inside a cell smaller than my old apartment, and a lot more secure. No bars, no doors, no windows, not even a grate that showed the world outside –– if one could call the Underworld _outside._ Nico and the skeleton guards just shoved me through the wall and left me in there. I'd tried to go back through the wall in the same way that I'd come in, but all I got was discouragement and some bad bruises in unfortunate places. They had taken off my chains, but that did no good seeing as my weapons were gone. Along with my weapons, they had taken my denim jacket, my shoes and socks, my cuff bracelet, and my watch; they had even taken my gold drachma necklace. The only two things in the seven- by five-foot cell with me were a metal bucket and an unreachable lantern on the high ceiling that burned with the same green fire that I had seen in the torches of the Hades cabin. Fortunately, the lantern provided many shadows in the corner, which I tried to use to shadow travel. Unfortunately, I couldn't. The shadows rejected me.

It would be an understatement to say that my situation totally sucked.

* * *

My life fell into a pattern. A grueling pattern, marked only by naps and the occasional visits from the guards to bring me food and empty the bucket. The food in question was not the most tasteful of delicacies, but I ate it anyway because the other option was to starve. I knew it was mortal food at first glance, so that if I ate it I wouldn't get locked in the Underworld for the remainder of my undoubtfully very short life, but it was poor mortal food at best. I had eaten better when I was living on the streets. Hades had probably sent out someone to prowl through the garbage cans behind restaurants and pick out the stuff that might be edible. It was hardly enough for comfort, but again, I ate it anyway. It came once a day, or at least as much as I could figure. I had no way to mark how many times they had come, so I kept track in my head. I lost count somewhere around eleven.

Somewhere around my fourteenth day in prison, I had two visits in one day. The first had been the skeleton guard, which had peeked its head through the otherwise-solid wall and thrown in my daily meal. I snatched up the plastic bag and prowled through it. Two small slices of cold cheese pizza. A half-eaten breadstick. A slightly moldy tangerine. A bottle of water. Score.

I devoured the aforementioned, even though it did little to soothe my constant hunger. When I was finished, I tossed my trash to the side and curled up in the shadowy corner. The cold stone floor was less than comfortable, but I had been sleeping on it for fourteen days in a row now. I was getting used to it. Lulled into drowsiness by boredom, I closed my eyes and turned my back to the entrance wall.

I'm not even sure if I actually slept. But what I am sure of is that barely after closing my eyes, a faint presence of someone living entered the fringes of my consciousness. I ignored it. But then I heard –– or rather, felt –– that same aura enter through the wall and into my prison cell. I recognized the aura even before the one whose it was spoke.

"Hey," said Nico softly. I pulled my legs closer to my chest and closed my eyes. I said nothing in reply. The silence was enough of an answer. "Look, I'm sorry," he managed to choke out after a while.

"About what?" I retorted, not even bothering to stand up, turn around, or even look at him.

"What do you think?" His voice hardened with every word he said.

"I think you should leave me alone in my misery."

"I came here to help you," he growled. "And all you're doing is pushing me down?"

"Why would you come to help me?" I asked lazily yet icily, standing up and facing him. "After kidnapping me, turning me over to your father, and throwing me into a cell, what do you think you can do to help me?"

"Look, I didn't have a choice," he shot back, but to me it just sounded desperate. I held up my hand, silencing whatever was going to follow.

"Save it," I snapped. "You're just making yourself sound more pathetic than you really are."

"Saige, I –– "

"Didn't mean to? I'm sorry, but that is not a relevant excuse. 'Oh, I knocked Saige unconscious, dragged her to the Underworld, and threw her into a doorless cell to rot. Whoopsie! I didn't mean to!' Is that what you were going to say?"

He said nothing for quite a while, and we were locked in a staredown. He blinked first, and turned his back on me. "I was going to help you," he said in a low voice. "Guess you don't care."

I think he was trying to make a dramatic and hostile exit, but that drama and hostility was never achieved because before reaching the exit wall he slipped on the discarded plastic water bottle that I had thrown across the room. He stumbled, and instinctively I rushed over to help him. He brushed my hands away and stood up on his own without meeting my eyes. Then he turned his back to me and stepped through the wall as if it wasn't even there, leaving me alone.

I banged my fist against the now-solid wall. Then, drawing my fist back, I rolled the gold drachma over my knuckles and caught it in my palm. Poor, stupid Nico hadn't even seen me take it.

Grinning, I slipped the stolen coin into my pocket. All I needed to do now is wait.

* * *

**Yeah, I know, things were a bit unclear. Complain all you want, but I'm keeping it until I get a better option.**

* * *

**Here is the most-asked question as of today: WHY DO YOU LOVE CLIFFIES SO MUCH?  
Answer to this question: Because they're FUN. And I like torturing you.**

* * *

**I eat reviews for breakfast. Unfortunately, I have been going hungry as of late.**

**Where did **_**that**_** come from?**


	8. Chapter 8

**Please read Overcoming the Tears. It may help in your understanding of some of the mental trauma taking place in this chapter. I would also very much like it if you reviewed it. And this one. What the heck, just review everything! O_O pretty please?**

* * *

**Chapter 8**

**Nico and I Both Get To Whack Somebody, Which May Or May Not Include Each Other**

I didn't have to wait long.

When a skeleton guard poked its head in through the wall to throw me my food the next day, I said, "Hey, Skully." It turned its hollow, glowing eyes towards me, and I rolled the gold drachma over my knuckles. "Care for a bit of cash?"

I flicked the coin to the skeleton, and the small gold piece clattered to the ground. As the guard bent down to pick it up, I charged at the wall.

Now, I knew one thing about these walls. While someone or something was coming through from the outside, it remained in a state of limbo, but once their entire form was through, it solidified behind them. As the skeleton was half in, half out of the wall, the wall wasn't really there at all. So as it bent down to pick up the coin, I could actually go through the wall. And that's what I did. And once on the other side, I kicked the skeleton in the pelvis and sent it flying all the way through and into the cell on the other side. Another thing about these walls –– once they were solid, only something from the outside could go in. Something inside couldn't come out. That skeleton wouldn't be coming out for a while.

I was in a long, cold, dark hallway… but weren't all hallways in Hades's palace long, cold, and dark? There were three skeleton guards there, all of them looking right at me with those weird glowing eyes, but when I pointed at each of them and channeled some of my dad's power through my finger, their eyes dimmed and they collapsed into piles of bones. I had used this trick several times before on some of my earlier trips to the Underworld, usually when I should not have been in the place where I had used the aforementioned trick. It sapped a bit of my strength, but I just ignored this and moved on.

One of the guards had a spear with a Stygian iron point, and I stole this. It was a bit heavier than my staff, but until I could find that, I would have to make do. Alarms had started to go off, and I could hear the chattering and clattering of skeleton guards as they ran towards me. The first turned a corner and came face to face with me, and I lashed out with my spear and caught it between the ribs. It burst into golden flames, and its comrades started backing away. During this moment of uncertainty, I held out my spear like a lance and charged through them. Several others, which had the misfortune to be within striking range of my spear, also exploded into fire. With the blazing skeletons behind me, I ran through the hallways on my bare feet.

I had mentally planned my course of escape –– because I knew that I couldn't shadow travel in Hades's palace unless I was allowed to –– while I was waiting. This course I followed, until I found myself standing outside Persephone's private dressing room. As I suspected, it was locked. A guard started running down the hallways towards me, and I instantly put it to sleep. I tried not to do it too often, but with every skeleton I incapacitated, I started getting a bit drowsier.

Quickly, I leaned my spear against my shoulder and reached up into my mass of hair. I always kept at least three hairpins up there for situations like this, but now one would probably suffice. I manipulated the little pin inside the dead bolt, and within a minute the door was open.

A wave of overpowering smell washed over me as I crept in. I could feel a sneeze arising, and I slipped inside and shut the door just in time for me to let the sneeze out. Ugh. Stupid allergies. Maybe I shouldn't have chosen Persephone's room as my escape route. The entire place was coated in flowers and other pollen-producing plants. But I'd only have to be in here for a few seconds. My exit was just over there, beyond the closed balcony doors.

And then, as if in echo, someone else sneezed.

I froze. That had come from somewhere in this room, namely the walk-in closet on the left side. Gripping my spear, I stepped towards the partially open door.

The door flew open seemingly on its own, and I found myself face-to-face with Nico.

He was holding his Stygian iron sword in a ready position, but this position faltered when he saw me. His black eyes widened. "You!"

"You!" I replied with equal surprise.

His mouth opened and closed, like a fish out of water. "What –– what are you doing here?"

"What are _you _doing here?" I repeated scornfully.

Nico sighed. "This is just great."

The door creaked open, and I swerved around. "And it just got better," I said sarcastically at seeing the newcomers. "What up, Hades."

The Lord of the Underworld, flanked by two dozen skeleton warriors, smiled coldly. "Now what are you doing out of your cell, child?" Despite the punctuation, it wasn't a question.

I knew I was insane. I knew I had no chance against the god and his undead soldiers, especially in my weakened condition. But nevertheless I gripped my spear in my classic fighting position and prepared to die. Oh well. Might as well go down violently.

Hades's icy smile only spread. "You don't want to do that," he advised sarcastically.

"You sure?" I asked cynically.

He pointed one long, pale finger at my spear, and instantly it started to tug on my arms with the unusual and sudden weight. I was forced to drop it to the ground, and with me unarmed, Hades stalked towards me like a cat. Reflexively, I backed away. But then he stopped, and I stopped also when I saw what had materialized in his hands. "Take it, Saige."

My eyes narrowed. Why was he offering me my staff? And was it really my staff? It couldn't be. He would never let me have such an advantage. He must know about the large-scale freezing blasts, if Nico had told him that about me.

"I can see you don't trust me," continued Hades. "Well, I don't blame you. Take it anyway." He tossed the staff to me, and I had no choice but to snatch it out of the air. It was my staff, all right. I knew that much. Hades was backing away, that suspiciously sinister smile still lingering on his thin lips. "Now go. Fight."

I raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

Hades pointed across the room. "Him. You. Fight."

I followed the direction of his pointing finger. My gaze landed on Nico, who was glancing at me, then his father, then me again, then back at his father. "You can't be serious," I scoffed.

"I am very serious," replied Hades evenly.

"Now?" I said.

He nodded.

"Here?" inquired Nico.

Another nod.

Nico and I exchanged a glance. Then, in perfect unison, we both asked, _"Why?"_

Hades rolled his eyes. "Because I'm bored, that's why!" he bellowed. He thought about this response, then continued, "And when Nico kills you, I'll be free of a burden and the blame will be on him. Problem solved."

"One last question," I asked, leaning against my newly found staff, "why did you say 'when'?"

He just waved a hand. "Probability of you winning against my son is very low," he replied. "I just don't think that you, the weak, clumsy, arrogant daughter of Thanatos, could achieve that."

"And if I did?"

"Then I would grant you your freedom, because there would be no more reason for the Greeks or the Romans to place blame on my son or me."

I considered this, and my eyes hardened. "I can't do that." I exchanged a glance with Nico, and solemnly, he nodded.

"I can't either," he said. "I betrayed her once. I can't –– "

He was cut off abruptly by the shaft of a certain staff, which in my hands had shot forward with me and sent him tumbling back. As he got to his knees, completely bewildered, and scrambled for his sword, I smiled humorlessly. "That was why I always beat you in dueling matches," I said coldly. " _'Never let your guard down. And never let your opponent get the first move.'_ In this case, you broke both rules."

Nico stood to his feet and brandished his sword. My small, cold smile transformed into a maniacal grin as the adrenaline rushed through me, augmented with the pent-up anger and fear of his betrayal that I had been keeping in for weeks. This anger and fear I would now use to strengthen myself as I fought the one who had once been my friend and was now my enemy. And brushing away whatever bit of sane reasoning I may or may not have had left, I charged.

* * *

It was only after my staff and his sword clashed together that the abandoned reasoning started to come back.

Hades had been right. The chances of me winning were slim at best. Fueled by my rage, I was at first unstoppable as Nico struggled under my furious onslaught of attacks. But once this initial rush of anger and adrenaline was spent, I started to tire. Nico had always been stronger than me, I knew. When we had dueled together back at the camp, I had made up for this lost strength by speed and agility. But some strength was still involved in survival, especially if your opponent has a sword and you only have a long stick, and what little strength I did have had been depleted by two weeks of imprisonment. I was skinnier than ever from malnutrition, and for this I regretted not eating that sandwich my guard had given me, or at least was going to give me before I so rudely rejected it.

Nico, however, seemed to have gotten stronger. Or maybe it was just in comparison to me. Either way, I was fighting a losing battle here. Speed couldn't make up for everything I had lost, and soon even this was wearing out. I could see in his glittering obsidian eyes the realization that I wasn't going to be able to survive against him forever.

This realization was right. So I decided to take out my trump card.

I twirled my staff, and the jagged crystal tip grazed his arm. But it only ripped through the top layer of his aviator's jacket –– _my_ aviator's jacket –– and the rip itself was not too bad. Even my staff had rules; the enchanted tip actually had to touch his body for it to take effect.

"I'm sorry for ruining your jacket," I said with mock politeness as I dodged and struck. "You seem awfully attached to it. Where'd you get it?"

"That's none of your business," snarled Nico, attacking and counterattacking with the speed of a snake.

I smiled. "Maybe it is. And maybe I don't even need you to answer." He said nothing and only swung his blade again, which I parried with the shaft of my staff. "Two years and three months ago," I began, "Friday, December the twenty-first. I traveled to visit my mother's grave in the smaller, older cemetery of Cincinnati. I brought black roses and this very staff." He had been swinging his sword when I said "black roses", and he faltered briefly. The blow was not as powerful or fast as it should have been, and I danced out of reach. I continued, the smile on my face growing bigger, "I knelt before my mother's grave, but after a few moments I saw a movement, and following that movement I saw a boy, curled up against the trunk of a yew tree." Nico tried not to show weakness, but for a brief second I saw the flash of recognition, or maybe panic, in his eyes as we dueled. "When I left, I took off that jacket and placed it over my mother's grave. I shadow traveled away before I could see what the boy would do, but not long ago I had a vision in which I saw that scene, except that after I left, I saw the boy crawl over to my mother's grave and pick up my jacket. That boy was you, Nico di Angelo. I was the one who gave you the hope to overcome the suffering."

Nico stumbled, and I was able to slip my hand down into his boot and slip out his Stygian iron dagger. I slashed with the blade, and when he jerked his head up to me, there was a small, thin line of red underneath his right eye. But the wound was not why I faltered. It was the pain and the surprise in the eyes above it that stopped me.

"You," he gasped. "Diane Thanem… Saige Thanem…"

"Don't just stand there, boy!" bellowed Hades from the sidelines. "Fight her!"

With some effort, he raised his sword, and our weapons clashed again. But my plan of psychological assault seemed to have backfired on me, because instead of hindering him, it only rekindled the blaze of hatred. The furious fire burned bright in his black eyes as he advanced. His sword was like a flickering black tongue, there and back again, and I could barely keep up.

Within a minute, he had disarmed me and had pinned me to the floor with the point of his sword at my throat.

Hades literally squealed. If I had not been the subject of his squealing, I might have laughed. But being in such an unfortunate position, I could and would do nothing. The Lord of the Underworld clapped his hands together like a schoolgirl and giggled, "Go on! I love this part!"

I don't know why I was so calm. Maybe the shock was just so overwhelming that I didn't even process it. Maybe somewhere, deep in my subconscious, I believed it was some kind of sick dream. Maybe it was the hope that my father would be able to bring me back. Maybe it was the comfort that if Nico killed me, it would be quick and painless. Maybe it was the justice in the knowledge that since I had been running from death for so long, it was time that I finally faced it.

Shadowed by his hair, his eyes were black as night and completely unforgiving. I met them without flinching, and repeated evenly, "Go on, Nico."

Nico blinked once. He took a deep breath and opened his mouth as if to say something, then he closed it.

I smiled as he gripped the black hilt of his sword, and as I watched the Stygian iron blade go up, I actually laughed.

* * *

**Ha ha! Worse than Mark of Athena, right?**

**You know, I've decided to go on hiatus for a year… just kidding.**

**If you don't review Saige will come after you with her freezer. Thanks, Andi ^_^**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

**Death Holds a Family Reunion**

He said five words:

"You can shadow travel now."

And then the sword, still going up, fell out of his hands and clattered on the black marble floor.

Hades's eyes widened as Nico grabbed my wrist and yanked me off the floor and to my feet. "What –– " the Lord of the Underworld started to say, but then he regained composure and pointed at me. "Get her!"

The skeleton guards charged me, but I leapt up and dove into the shadows of Persephone's closet. Shadow travel location –– _anywhere but here,_ I thought grimly as the shadows wrapped themselves around me.

* * *

My request was granted. I ended up somewhere in northern Wisconsin, surrounded on all sides by huge, but still budding, trees. Just great. Well, at least I wasn't in the Underworld anymore. Tired beyond belief, I collapsed on the ground and leaned against the trunk of a tree. It was chilly, but I didn't care. It was dark, but I didn't care. I was hungry, but I didn't care. I was vulnerable, but I didn't care. I was too overwhelmed with the events that had taken place in such quick succession and so shortly ago, yet felt like they had happened years before.

_So this means that I can still trust him,_ my drowsy mind said. _Or does it?_ Hades wanted me dead. _Nico _wanted me dead. I could see it in both of their lifeless, impenetrable eyes. The way Nico's sanity had seemed to snap at the mention of that cold winter day on which our fates had first intertwined had led me to believe that he was perfectly capable of killing me. In his eyes was the purpose. In his hands was the means. In his heart was the will.

So why didn't he use them against me?

Nico's status in my mind changed with seemingly every movement he made. He had been a trespasser. Then a brother. Then an ally. Then a friend. Then a crush. Then a betrayer. Then a captor. Then an adversary. What was he now? A rescuer? A helper? A reformed enemy? None of them sounded right.

A liberator. That was it.

Nothing was making sense. Questions swirled like a whirlpool, pulling me under and forcing me to breathe in their confusion. Many of the questions were similar to the list I had made on that long-ago night I had received the two flashbacks and the dream, but this time, I couldn't pick out individual ones. It was just so… confusing for my muddled mind. This feeling of desperation made me feel helpless and empty inside; I hated not knowing something. Curiosity was what drove me to do many of the crazy things my insane self did, and when this curiosity was left unfed, it started to protest.

My head was spinning. And I think I was having my very first migraine. Physically exhausted from shadow traveling and my duel against Nico, internally weak from malnutrition, and mentally drained from the unrelenting questions that nagged at me like agitated ghosts, I dropped off to sleep.

* * *

"Saige."

I groaned and curled up tighter. "Rrm."

"Saige."

"Dad," I muttered, not even opening up my eyes to confirm my theory of the identity of my waker, "goway. Not time for school yet."

"You quit school after the third grade."

"Rrm. I'dn care. Goway."

"You look awful."

"Thanks. G'night."

"You're not wearing shoes, or a jacket. What happened? Where's your staff?"

"Got kidnapped. Went to the Underworld. Almost died. Shadow traveled. Dropped off here. Cake. Lemme sleep."

"Saige, get up."

Something, maybe the authority in his voice, maybe the knowledge that he probably wasn't going to leave me alone until he got what he wanted, made me open my eyes and sit up. Yawning, I stretched and leaned up against a nearby tree. I was still in the forest. Judging by the light, it was late morning. Somewhere around ten o'clock, I believe. Dad sat casually on the ground nearby, with one arm resting on his knee and the other holding the shaft of his scythe, which was leaning against his shoulder in the same way that I did with my staff. In his more casual clothes, and without his huge wings, he almost looked like a regular mortal. Albeit a mortal with a huge Stygian iron scythe. I stretched again and asked, "Got anything to eat?"

He tossed me a bagel and a box of orange juice. "Not too much, and not too fast. You've been underfed."

I shrugged, pulled the pre-cut bagel in half, and took a bite. Yum. Cinnamon raisin. My favorite. "Where's the honey?"

A plastic bear-shaped bottle of glittering golden honey quickly followed. I squirted the gooey substance all over the surface of my bagel, then took another bite. Yum. Cinnamon raisin with honey, my personal creation. Even better.

"How did you get hurt?" Dad asked, gesturing to my arm.

I looked down at it. The sleeve of my t-shirt had been ripped, and underneath was a long, thin cut running down my bicep. It was bleeding, but not much. I hadn't even noticed it until now. Must've happened during my fight with Nico. "It's a long story."

Thanatos reached out and ran his index finger down the wound, which healed instantly. "I have time."

I sighed in preparal of telling my tale, but then Thanatos raised the same finger he had healed me with. "Wait a sec." He pulled his sleek black iPad out from his jacket and tapped the screen once. I knew who it was even before he said anything. "Hey, Hades! Don't tell me that I have to –– "

"This is not about what you have to do," said Hades through Skype. "I was just wondering… have you seen your daughter lately?"

"My daughter?" repeated Thanatos, perfectly poker-faced. Then he narrowed his eyes and said suspiciously, "You found out?"

"Yes, yes, congratulations and so forth," Hades sighed. "The point is, have you seen her lately?"

"Not since I claimed her at Camp Half-Blood three weeks ago," said Dad, the lie slipping smoothly and perfectly off his tongue. "I thought she would be safe –– wait, what did she do?"

"Nothing!" replied Hades, a bit too quickly in my opinion. "Never mind… well, keep an eye out for her, and if you see her, bring her to me so we can talk."

"About?" inquired Thanatos, but Hades had already hung up. Rolling his golden eyes, Dad slipped his iPad back into his jacket, where it promptly disappeared. "All right, Saige. What did you do?"

"Nothing!" I blurted. "I swear, I didn't do anything?"

Raising an eyebrow, Thanatos folded his arms.

I couldn't stand the pressure. "All right, maybe I might have damaged a few of Hades's guards, but I was provoked!"

"By…?"

"Them. And Hades. And, to some extent, Nico."

"Nico?"

"He was being forced. He helped me –– "

"I highly doubt it. I want the whole story, beginning to end."

Sighing, I reluctantly told him everything, including the parts about Nico. And without interrupting once, he listened. When I finished, he was silent. I had finished the honey bagel and the orange juice. We sat in companionable silence, neither saying a word as we mulled over our own thoughts and just stayed there, listening to the first birds of early spring. Then he said, "You know that if you had died, I wouldn't be able to bring you back."

I nodded silently. I had figured as much.

"I would want to. Know that I would. It's just that… it's against the rules."

I nodded again. "I understand now. That's why you couldn't bring back Mum."

The expression on his face was similar to that of which would have shown if I had stabbed him with a rusty dagger. His golden eyes glittered wetly. "Diane…" Here he hesitated and inhaled deeply. "Diane was a wonderful woman. So beautiful, so strong, so brave, so intelligent… you remind me so much of her, Saige."

I said nothing. I'm not sure I could have if I had wanted to.

"And clear-sighted, too. Even when I chose not to be seen, she could see me, and when she did, she only rolled her eyes as if she was crazy. For so long, she had thought that she was."

"Until she met you," I finished.

Dad nodded. "Yes. And when she did, I learned what love at first sight was. She played hard-to-get; always turning her back, always teasing… but she was just so beautiful that I couldn't help but keep trying. And then one day, she admitted it. She loved me and wanted to be with me, even though it was impossible. And then you came along. She was overjoyed, but it was so unexpected that I got angry with your mother, and we fought."

"You left us."

"I'm afraid I did. The shock was just too much. When we first met, I had been afraid. Afraid that I'd get nervous, slip up, and kill her at the first moment our hands touched. I couldn't risk it. But she was willing to take that risk, and the first night that we ever touched was our third date."

"When she kissed you."

"And I was terrified. If touching her frightened me… well, Diane was the first woman I had ever loved, so when you came along, I was scared out of my wits. I was scared that had given life to someone. I was scared that I would kill _you._ And when men, even immortal gods, are scared, they get angry, and they fight. And I, like the coward I am, fled after fighting. I didn't come back for years, and when I did, you were already born, and so big that I couldn't help but fall in love with you, too. So I stayed."

"And then Mum died in the accident."

He took in a choked breath, and nodded again. "I wanted to heal her," he said, almost crying, "but I control death, not life… and I knew that living like that, asleep under the life support for however long she might survive in the coma, was no life at all… so I told the doctors to take her off. I… I didn't know what to say to you, Saige, but I knew that the time was coming when you would have to learn how to control your powers, and when you would have to survive on your own."

I was silent. Then, after a long pause during which my surprisingly and suddenly emotional father tried to catch his breath, I asked, "Why didn't you ever help me?"

He met my gaze, and I saw a familiar, flickering golden fire in his eyes that I had seen only once before –– and that event had not ended particularly well. "I did help you."

I folded my arms. "When?"

"I gave you life," he said in a voice as hard as steel. "I never knew I could, but I did. I gave you comfort when your mother died. I gave you your weapons for a chance at living. And when that Nico boy was shadow traveling to California, who diverted the shadows to drop him into your apartment? _I _did! I was _claiming_ you."

This brought two relevant pieces of information, both of which I wanted to branch off of but only one of which I could use. _Thanatos_ had brought Nico to my apartment? But why? The answer came to me so simply that I was stunned –– my father's words rang true. He was claiming me. He was giving me a chance at another life. A life at Camp Half-Blood, where I would be accepted.

So I branched off the second piece of information: "But between that moment when you gave me my staff and that moment when you sent Nico to me," I said, "there was a three-year gap. Three. _Years._ You visited me only a few times after Mum died. I lived on the _streets_. And _now_ you care?" My voice grew harder and colder with every word.

"Saige, I –– " He stopped the imminent tirade and took a deep breath, lowering his head and his voice. "I have no excuse."

I, now in battle mode, wasn't expecting this. "What?"

"I should have helped you. I should have taken care of you. And I _didn't_. I forgot about you, Saige. I'm sorry."

No denial. No feeble excuses. No "I tried"s. Only the outright truth. Another difference between mortal and immortal parents.

And before I could contain them, the tears slipped down my cheeks.

"I'm sorry," I blustered. "I'm not used to this. I don't know what to say."

He laughed, half-strangled by crying. "I'm not either," he confessed. "It's not often that I talk like this to anybody."

"Me neither!" I giggled almost hysterically.

And so there we sat, Death and his daughter, tittering like idiots in some random secluded forest in Wisconsin.

All I can say is that it was probably the world's weirdest family reunion.

* * *

**Okay, I know, lame chapter ending. But whatever. I couldn't think of anything else.**

**This chapter was really hard for me to write, especially part two because I am not a dialogue person. So please don't go on complaining that Thanatos was "OOC" or whatever. Because even Death has emotions, however rarely he shows them. And, being his first and only daughter, Saige is special to him in ways only describable by a loving, and frankly quite frazzled, father.**

**This is not the end of the story. The last (maybe) chapter will be posted tomorrow!**

**Reviews are love...**


	10. Chapter 10

**Only three reviews for the last chapter? *sniffles sadly* I need to give you guys some better cliffies…**

**Whatever. Just R&R.**

* * *

**Chapter 10**

**I Become a Weed Killer**

Thanatos took me back to Camp Half-Blood, only to be pelted with questions and stampeded by gawking campers. I almost wished that we had stayed up in that forest. At the private suggestion of my father, I limited my story to, "Ran an errand in the Underworld. Got captured by Hades. Fought some guards. Cake." It wasn't entirely a lie. More like the shortened truth.

At which point Jason, curse him, had asked, "What kind of errand?"

Dad and I exchanged a glance and said in rehearsed unison, "Death stuff. Mind your own business."

No one had asked after that.

* * *

I found out the reason for the campers' stares soon after. I was washing up in the bathrooms, preparing to take my first shower in two weeks. When I looked at myself in the mirror, though, I saw that the girl staring back at me was not me. The hollow, thin cheeks. The sunken, wild eyes. The prominent ribs, easily counted. The tangled shock of choppy brown hair. The bony, way too skinny body. The pale skin –– much paler than it had been before. A ghost come to earth, she looked like.

She was older. She was taller. She was not me. But I recognized her. She was the girl who had run away three years in an effort to escape Death. Death had found her as she was now, and had given her meaningless words of false comfort and a weapon which she did not know how or against whom to use it.

At least, that was what I had convinced myself to believe. Upon seeing this girl for the second time, I now knew that Death had given me a chance. Both of them. Lovestruck Thanatos, the one who had given me life. Brave Nico di Angelo, who had spared my life.

Not for the first time and definitely not for the last, I regretted not thanking either of them.

* * *

For a week afterwards my return, I was instructed to "take it easy". The long weeks of imprisonment had done more damage than I knew, and I discovered that I couldn't even eat a full meal without my shrunken stomach protesting angrily. But I couldn't let my muscles atrophy, so every day I either tackled the climbing wall or tried my hand at different weapons, sometimes both if I felt strong enough. Gods knew where my staff was –– and that was meant literally, and not just as a derogatory saying, seeing as Hades had been the one to take my staff away in the first place –– and my father did not bother replacing it for reasons I at first did not know, so I had to find some kind of replacement. I didn't like swords of any kind, spears were too heavy, knives didn't feel right without a wooden freezer in the other hand, and I couldn't shoot an arrow to save my life. A very nice dryad offered me a toughened branch of hers that was roughly the same size and weight as my staff, and because I figured it would hurt to pull out one's own branch, I accepted it. But, unlike my staff, I couldn't freeze people with it. Oh well. It would do until my dad beat the crap out of Hades while trying to get my real staff back.

I didn't expect it to take two weeks. And for the record, it wasn't Thanatos who gave it back to me.

* * *

It had been thirteen days since I had been brought back to Camp Half-Blood. I had been heading back to my cabin from the campfire, at which I had arrogantly bet Leo Valdez that I could start the fire without a match faster. (I had lost. I didn't know that he had a lighter built into his hand.)

On my way, I passed cabin thirteen. It was empty, as it had been for the past four weeks. The last memory I had of the occupant was an image of him dropping his sword and saying those last five words. I was relatively certain that he was not dead, but I could never be completely sure. Two weeks was long enough for me to examine and turn over all possibilities. None of them I particularly liked. I knew from personal experience that Hades did not appreciate upstart, rebellious young demigods, especially if those aforementioned demigods helped free the one he wanted dead.

Which brought up another question. _Why_ had Nico helped me? Defiance was no complete answer. I saw the way Nico feared his father, and how Hades abused his son. If Nico was beaten for talking back –– which I had no doubt that he had been, due to those bruises on his face I had seen before –– I was actually scared to find out what would happen to him on this level of resistance. No. Defiance was part of it, but not the whole reason. The real answer, or what I suspected was the real answer, made me somewhat uncomfortable, along with a generous helping of a feeling that one might call "giddiness". Could I have been right? Maybe Nico… maybe he did like me. And maybe he saw that I liked him back.

Turning my back on that cabin and trying to push the thoughts of you-know-who out of my mind, I started heading towards my own. I scrunched up my nose when I saw all of the dandelions on the persistent grass that grew in a three meter radius around the walls of my cabin and around the perfect ring of dead, bare ground that surrounded the aforementioned walls. Hades must have told Persephone that I had invaded her dressing room. The stupid weeds just kept coming back. I'd tried everything –– a weed whacker, a lawn mower, weed poison, even a satyr with a pipe who _claimed_ that a few notes would send those dandelions to die. I had even tried touching them to kill them, like I had seen my dad do occasionally, though never particularly on yellow weeds. I could do the same, but only on small organisms. Sure, I succeeded, but the next day the little allergy factories were always back.

I sneezed. Persephone must've been really mad at me. My pollen allergies had taken a nosedive –– no pun intended –– just the previous week, and they weren't showing any signs of quitting any time soon. Sighing, I bent down and brushed my hand over the yellow heads of the weeds. Every dandelion I touched dried up and wilted. Taking off my shoes, I started kicking the yellow-dotted grass. It was so fun kicking them with my bare feet and then watching them die. Unlike some of my other powers, when I killed things in this way, their life energy was transferred to me. So for every dandelion I killed, I only grew more energetic. This in itself was not a good thing, seeing as I had eaten at least seven marshmallows at the campfire and that I already had a sugar rush. Soon I was running around hyped up to the max, stomping on dandelions and laughing hysterically as they dried up and wilted.

"Go to bed, Saige," yelled a voice from a nearby cabin. Slightly embarrassed, I slunk into my cabin with my shoes in hand.

Inside, I sighed as I relaxed in the cool, dark environment. I dropped my shoes on the floor and leaned my stick against the wall next to my bed, but then I noticed something resting on my violet comforter. It was a long, narrow box that spanned the entire length of the bed, wrapped in black paper and topped with a stick-on silver bow. I opened it curiously. Resting inside were several familiar items –– a folded denim jacket, a silver watch, a black cuff bracelet, a pair of Converse, two black socks, a necklace with a gold drachma pendant, a black-bladed dagger, and a long wooden staff with a glittering violet crystal tip. Everything that had been taken from me when I had been imprisoned in the Underworld.

Almost in awe, I took all of the items out of the box and put them on their proper places. Cuff bracelet on my left wrist, watch on my right. Necklace around my neck, jacket over my shoulders, dagger in my sheath, and staff in my hands. It all felt right. But who…?

Before I could even finish the thought, there was a sneeze. Not mine. I swerved around to see a boy, dressed in black, brown, and silver, step out of the shadows. "Ugh. Stupid allergies."

"Nico!" I cried, attacking him in a hug. He gasped and stumbled, but I held on so tightly that he couldn't fall over even if he had wanted to. Then, after a few seconds of awkwardness, he hugged me back.

When I pulled away, I didn't pull away entirely. I gazed into his eyes, saw the still-healing cut I had given him, saw the fading bruises not entirely hidden by his hair that I didn't think came from our fight. I instantly felt guilty. "What did he do to you?"

He tried to give what might have been a weak smile. I saw right through it, but said nothing. "Something unpleasant. I'm all right now." I didn't tell him that the two sentences completely contradicted each other.

"Oh, poor Nico," I murmured as I retreated back into his hug. "Poor, denying, self-conscious, hostile, egocentric, stupid little Nico."

A couple of seconds later, after he digested that, he frowned and asked, "Why am I stupid?"

I didn't reply, just held him without saying a word.

But after about a minute, or what I suppose was a minute, he said, "I saw the dandelions."

I pulled away entirely and stared at him. "After two weeks, the first things you say are 'stupid allergies', 'something unpleasant; I'm all right now', 'why am I stupid', and 'I saw the dandelions'?"

He looked away uncomfortably, shoving his hands into the pockets of his aviator's jacket. "I'm not good with friendly reunions."

I shrugged. "Eh, forgiven. Neither am I." Then my eyes widened as some of his previous words finally sunk in. "Wait, you saw the dandelions?"

He kept avoiding my eyes. "Yeah."

"You saw what I _did_ to the dandelions?"

Nico hid his mouth behind his hand and gave what might have passed as a very strange sneeze. "Yeah."

"You're laughing at me again!"

"At least this time it's not clowns," he remarked, trying to hide his grin but ultimately failing as a whole.

I scowled, but my smiling eyes gave me away. "Shut up."

He did, and his face immediately set back into its usual solemn self. "I lied about the clowns."

"What?"

"About being scared of clowns. I lied when I said I was scared of them."

"Why?"

"I was scared of you."

I let out a short bark of laughter, which turned into a full-out fit. Soon he was laughing with me. Hence his surprise when, after about ten seconds of uncontrollable giggling on both of our parts, I stepped forward and slapped him. Hard. All laughs stopped, and he stared at me with those large, expressive dark eyes. There was a red mark showing clearly on his pale skin where my hand had made contact. "What did you do that for?"

"That," I said, "was for leaving me." His mouth opened in a protest, but that aforementioned protest would never come out. I lifted the shaft of my staff and drove it into his foot, turning that protest into a strangled yelp. _"That_ was for kidnapping me." Next I kneed him in the stomach, sending him keeling over with a strange guttural grunt. _"That_ was for betraying me." And this was when I did something that neither of us would easily forget –– I tilted his head up and kissed him. Right on the cheek, exactly where I had slapped him. "And that," I whispered shyly, "was for everything else."

I gave an awkward half-smile as he stared at me, a mixture of awe and confusion in his eyes. "So… I guess that means you forgive me?"

I shrugged mischievously. "I don't know. Does it?"

But in my eyes was the answer. The smile on my face spread to his as we drew closer. He leaned forward…

And I placed my index finger on his lips. "Nuh uh, zombie dude. That's my job. Now out of my cabin."

His eyes widened. "What?"

"You heard me. Out! Back to your own cabin! Shoo!" As extra motivation, I swung my staff at him as he scrambled to the door. He ran out the door, but I stopped at the front step to watch him flee. And I smiled.

"They don't come much better than that, huh Dad?" I asked, tilting my head to the sky.

I knew Nico could hear me.

I'm pretty sure he also knew that I could hear him as he slowed his pace, touched his cheek, and said, "Wow."

And I'm very sure that I knew what the answer to my question was. Why had Nico spared me?

I knew that I was right with my first guess.

Maybe he did like me. And maybe I liked him.

Just a little bit.

* * *

**I have decided. There will be no sequel.**

**However, I have also decided that I am not entirely done with this fanfiction.**

**It is merely going on a very long hiatus. I will return sometime after October, when the you-know-what-of-who will be released. When I discover if Nico survives and decide how Saige will react, I will come back. I have two alternate endings for either possibility. And no, I will not take those two endings and publish them now. I do not want to make any suppositions about the book before it is released, because when people do that to unpublished books it mildly annoys me and I do not want to become a hypocrite. Hence the hiatus. But if I do continue, I may have to change the title. Because I already have the continuation mentally planned out, and I have found that the title only applies to these first ten chapters.**

**I will return. I promise you.**

"_**Promises could be dangerous things. They would either hold you accountable or come back to haunt you later."**_

**Yeah, I know I take that risk. And you, the masses, have permission to hold me accountable.**

**Sky out, for now ^_^**


	11. Chapter 11

**No, I have not gotten a private copy of HoH and written the continuation. I only wish.**

**This is just a cute fluffy something that's been running around my mind for a while, and I couldn't help but use it. Ah, what brilliant things plot bunnies can grow into. So this is just a little oneshot –– "little" being the underestimation of the year seeing as this chapter is longer than all of the others except Chapter 3 –– to keep you satisfied until the real thing comes. So here's my little treat… ooh, like an appetizer… or a dinner mint! I love dinner mints! Agh! Sorry.**

**Also: I changed the number of the Thanatos cabin from nineteen to twenty-nine. I just thought there would be more than eighteen cabins at the time Saige arrived in camp, because in TLO it was described that new cabins were being added to the blueprints almost every day.**

**And I drew a different cover art because the other one sucked.**

**So, without further ado, here it is! The very first (and potentially last) Saigico Fluff Fest!**

* * *

**Chapter 11**

**I Force-Feed a Necromancer**

It was three days after our… ergh… kiss, and Nico was still too timid to look me in the eye.

Or maybe it was me. I don't know.

Point is, we were staying away from each other. And I don't think we knew why. I mean, after the kiss *wince* weren't we supposed to be all lovey-dovey, holding hands-y, giving me roses and chocolate-y? At least, that's what I saw in the movies. On the few occasions that I felt like sneaking into the theater.

As I was saying –– _ADHD, work with me here _–– we were way too uncomfortable around each other now. What had I done? By doing… _that _to him, any casual friend relationship we had had with each other was yanked away, torn to shreds, and flushed down the toilet. I mean, it wasn't like we had done a full-out, lips-on-lips kiss. Just a little one, and it was all my fault. But it seemed as if I had crossed the line with Nico, and the look in his eyes afterwards had crossed the line with me. Everything was different now and we didn't know why. I couldn't even pass cabin thirteen without getting a weird, fluttery feeling in my stomach.

Lacy, a camper who wasn't much older than I, must've seen the strange, awkward grimace on my face that undoubtfully gave away whatever I wanted to keep secret about my stomach butterflies, because she came up to me and asked, "Nico, huh?"

I scowled at her, or at least tried. The mere mention of the four-letter Italian name brought a faint smile to my face that wasn't voluntary. She grinned, showing her braces.

"You are perfect for him, you know? The two emo kids of Camp Half-blood… it's just so cute!" she squealed. My glare trumped the smile, and she seemed to get the message. "Oops! Sorry. Is it too public out here?"

Palm, meet face. Face, meet palm. Facepalm. "Please stay out of my love life," I said, gritting my teeth and walking away. Hey, I couldn't help it! She was borderline creepy, and I was really tired even though it was one in the afternoon. I was something of a night owl. Usually my schedule went something like this: wake up at 7 AM for breakfast. Train until lunch. Take nap after lunch. Wake up at 6 PM before dinner. Stay up until 3 AM in the morning. Go to bed, then wake up at 7 AM for breakfast. And right now, I was supposed to be taking my five-hour nap.

"My mom is the love goddess," she said, jogging up to my side. "I could help, if you want me to."

"Okay, let me get this straight," I said, stopping and holding up a hand. "One, you are _way_ too peppy. Two, there is no_ love_ going on between me and that kid. Three, who said I wanted help?"

Lacy gave a sly smile, glanced around, and leaned in as if sharing a secret. "No one," she whispered. "But I know what's going on. I saw Nico sneak into your cabin three nights ago, and I saw him leave five minutes later. I think I can guess what happened while you were in there…"

I clamped my hand over her mouth. "I swear by the Styx, daughter of Aphrodite, that if you tell anyone about whatever is up there in that head of yours I will duct tape the Shoes of Shame to your feet after dunking them in Super Glue."

Her eyes were wide, and I could tell that she was wondering how I knew about the Shoes of Shame. Well, it's a long story, and I will say only that it involved the Stoll twins and nothing more.

"Am I clear?" I said icily. I was very clear. She nodded, and I let her go. "So how do you think you can help me?"

Lacy leaned in and lowered her voice again. "I'll give you some advice," she said.

"Oh, goody," I said sarcastically. "Advice. Yay. Continue."

She frowned at me in what I think might have been her approximation of a glare. "I'm serious," she said. "Now do you want my help or not?"

I sighed, unfazed by the glare. "Whatever. What is your excellent advice?"

"He wants you to make the first move."

I raised an eyebrow. "Really?"

She nodded frantically, glad that she was getting her point across to me. "You talk to him first," she said. "Ask him what's wrong, and if he pulls away, pull him closer."

"Remember, this is _Nico di Angelo_ we're talking about," I hissed. "If he gets scared off –– "

"He gets scared off because he's not used to affection," replied Lacy, a strange light flickering in her blue eyes. "You have to show that you care about him."

"But I don't want to show him that I care about him… like that," I said. "I want us to just be friends again. I regret kissing him. It's like I severed the friendly bond that we had."

"So you admit that you kissed him."

"Yes! But that's not the point! The point is –– "

"That's exactly the point, though. That kiss changed everything, didn't it?"

"Well, if you put it that way, then… yeah, I guess."

"And if you pretend that it never happened, he'll notice that since nothing's different to you, nothing should be different to him. And sooner or later, you'll both forget about it. Well, scratch that. You won't forget about it, but at least it won't completely destroy your relationship. Sure, maybe you'll be a bit more awkward around him, but at least you two can regain that bond you had."

I considered this. "Well…"

"Be _bold_," she prompted, her eyes glimmering again. "Just go up to him and talk like nothing ever happened. Ask him to have a duel with you in the sword-fighting arena. Challenge him to a footrace. Bet him that you can eat more hot dogs in one sitting. Something casual."

I took a deep breath. Maybe Lacy wasn't such a dunderhead after all. This was really good advice. The problem wasn't just the kiss, though. It was _why _I had kissed him –– he had spared my life. I couldn't just pretend that nothing had happened.

"But what if it wasn't just the kiss?" I asked. I knew the risky steps I was taking with this, but it was the only way to find out. "What if he had done something for me?"

"It depends on what scale of 'something' that would be," she remarked. "Did he give you a present? Like a necklace or a bracelet?"

"He did," I replied, "but that was after he stole them from me."

"Oh," she sighed. "Is that what he did for you?"

"I never said he actually did that something," I said. "I was asking _what if_ he had done something for me, something really big?"

"Like, how huge?"

"Would kidnapping me and then sparing my life be a good example?"

Her jaw dropped, and I swear I could see her eyes literally glowing. "Did he really…?"

"I will say nothing more except that if you tell anybody, they will never find your body. Now give me that advice, lover girl."

She took a deep breath in to compose herself, then said, "Did you thank him?"

"The kiss was kind of the thank you."

"Then just go."

"Go where?"

"To him. My earlier advice is good enough. Just talk to him casually. Even if it was a really big deal, pretend it never happened."

"I can't just do that," I protested. "He saved my _life."_

"Then be grateful," she answered, "but don't pressure him. If he's pressured into thinking that you are too grateful for it, he'll think he owes you, hence the awkwardness."

"But I'm starting to think that I owe _him."_

"Then show him that you don't. Make the first move. Be casual. If you can't pretend it never happened, act as if what did happened was a good thing, but that it's not going to change anything between you two."

I took a deep breath. I was getting a serious headache from this conversation. "All right," I said. "I never thought I'd say this to a daughter of the love goddess, but… thank you. You've been a great help."

Lacy's eyes lit up, but this time with a different, almost freakish light. "Really?"

I rubbed my eyes. Her very white teeth were almost blinding in the sun, especially with the sparkly braces on them. "Yes. Now please, let me take a nap, and I'll think it over."

The blond-haired girl literally jumped up and down. "Yay! I helped someone! Okay, tell me if there are any results! You know where to call!" And before I could say another word, she skipped off to put on makeup or arrange outfits or do whatever it is children of Aphrodite do.

* * *

I didn't see him at dinner that night, or anytime after my nap in general, but the next morning, at breakfast, I did. Chef's special was crêpes that day, and everyone was digging in. Except Nico, who was sitting alone at table thirteen with nothing in front of him, not even a plate. I looked down at the oversized crêpe on my plate. It was what I called a Nutella crêpe, with sliced bananas and… well, Nutella. The entire thing was practically doused with the melted chocolate/hazelnut mixture, and it had to be the best thing I had ever tasted. And it was huge, so by the time I was halfway through I was absolutely stuffed. And there Nico was, with nothing.

So I did the first thing that came to mind –– I made the first move. I got up, took my plate, and walked over to him. As I came closer, I noticed that his eyes were partly closed, and he was fingering a small something… was it a necklace? He seemed half asleep, and I wouldn't have been surprised to find that he had forgotten to take a plate. But when I sat down directly across from him, I found that this was sadly not the case.

His head jerked up, and he dropped whatever it was he was playing with. Yup, it was a necklace. That same one that I'd seen him wearing for… well, ever since I'd known him. I'd only gotten a glance at what it was –– it was a tiny lead statue, no longer than my pinky finger. He had threaded a wire through a small hole in the statue's helmet, and wore it as a necklace. I always wondered where it came from, and what its significance was, but I'd never dared to ask.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, his voice not devoid of suspicion and maybe a bit of... fear?

I grinned and set my plate onto the table. "I'm here to make you eat."

"We're not allowed to switch tables –– "

"Since when have I cared about what was allowed?" I asked cynically. "What's more important than the rules is why you're not eating."

He shrugged half-heartedly and averted his eyes. "I'm not hungry."

"Really?" I inquired, arching my brow.

He only nodded and shrugged again, with the same lethargy as before.

"Why do you never eat?"

"I eat."

"Not today you haven't."

Another half-hearted shrug from the son of Hades. "Yeah. But I'm not hungry."

I didn't reply. I only slid my plate across the table to him, leaned forward, and smiled. "Eat the crêpe."

He stared at me. "But –– "

"Eat it."

"I'm not hungry."

"Yes, you are."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are. I can see it."

"No, I'm not!"

"Two things: one, anorexia is so unflattering, and two, you're not pulling anything. Eat the crêpe."

"I don't want to eat the crêpe."

"I don't care. Eat the crêpe."

"Mm mm." He pressed his lips together, refusing to open them even to talk.

I stabbed my fork into the crêpe, cut a piece, and held it up. "Eat."

"Mm mm." Now he was just being childish and mischievous. Perfect. He'd finally remembered how to have fun with me.

"Eat it," I enunciated slowly, sticking it into his face. "Eeeeeeeat iiiiiiiiiiit."

He shook his head, and I saw his mouth curling into a smile. I tried to push away my own smile and take out my threatening demeanor, even though I know he'd see right through it.

"You know you want it," I said, leaning forward farther.

"Mm mm," he said, stifling a laugh.

"You have to eat, Nico," I argued. "If you don't eat, you'll die. And if you die, I'll cry. And if I cry, then Lacy will cry. And if Lacy cries, Piper will cry. And if Piper cries, Jason will cry. And if Jason cries, Annabeth will cry. And when Annabeth cries, Butch will cry. And when Butch cries… well, forget it. Then we all just lose it."

He was trying not to laugh but failing miserably. I have to admit, the visual image of me, Lacy, Piper, Jason, Annabeth, and Butch all sobbing uncontrollably over a dead Nico was rather funny, minus the dead Nico part. I didn't really want him to die –– duh –– I was just making a point.

"Come on," I said, grabbing his hand and sticking the fork in his hand. "Eat the crêpe. It's not much. Just a bite."

Nico held the fork, and for a second it seemed like he was going to eat it. He reached across and pulled my plate, with the crepes still on it, over to him, dipped the piece of crêpe into the Nutella, brought it up to his mouth, and then set the fork down. No, I did not miss anything. It went from the air in front of his mouth to the plate. He didn't even take a bite.

"Hey!" I cried indignantly. "I told you to eat it!"

"I'm not hungry," he said again, still trying to stifle the laughter.

"I don't care! Eat it!"

Nico shook his head again.

"Eat."

And finally, he relented. "Okay, okay! I'll eat!"

"Really?"

"Yes!"

"Then pick up that fork, di Angelo."

He did so. Then he stuck the bit of Nutella-coated crêpe into his mouth.

But I wasn't about to announce victory yet. "Chew and swallow…"

He did so.

"Now for bite number two…"

"There's a number two?" He was acting all whiny, but I knew he loved it.

"Why not? You liked that crêpe, Nico di Angelo. I can see it. I _know _it. Why not?"

"I'm not hungry!"

"You're hungry enough to look hungry and to enjoy that crêpe. Now keep enjoying it or I'll douse you in barbecue sauce and dump you in Mrs. O'Leary's food bowl. And don't say I won't do it!"

Now neither of us could really control our laughter, and the other campers were staring at us strangely. Neither of us really cared. I, and undoubtfully many other people, watched eagerly as Nico picked up the fork again, stabbed the crêpe, brought a large piece to his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. Leo Valdez started a round of applause.

And because I was laughing, Nico started to laugh too. And, with me nagging his every bite, he started to eat. Actually eat. He ate about half before he started to look seriously stuffed, and was literally crying a bit because we were both laughing so hard. It took us a few minutes to calm down, and by then most people had left the dining pavilion.

* * *

We walked out to the forest together –– we would have gone to the sword fighting arena, except that the Roman/Greek fiasco (starring Jason Grace) hadn't been cleared up yet –– and to my favorite spot. It would be the first time I had ever taken anyone with me, and I was actually kind of nervous. I didn't know what he would think of it. It was an outcropping of rock jutting out over the river, shaded by trees but with a nice view of the river, the forest, and the sky above.

I took off my shoes and socks and sat on the edge of the outcropping, letting one bare foot dangle down and drawing the other one up to my chest as I rested my arm on my knee and my staff on my shoulder. I could stay in such a position for hours if I let my thoughts just roam, and if I didn't have allergies that sent me back inside after more than ten minutes. Nico stood behind me, just looking out at the view. There was just enough space on the rock's surface for another person to sit, and at a silent beckon from me Nico uncomfortably slid down beside me. So awkwardness returns when we're completely alone. Go figure.

After a long moment of silence I said, "It's really pretty at night."

He nodded. "Yeah."

Silence was drifting over us again. Usually I liked silence, but with him it just felt weird. I had been going somewhere with this returning-to-friendship thing when forcing him to eat, but now I was back to square one. "Hey, you can take off your shoes too. And your jacket. Oh, and you might want to put away your weapons, too."

"Why? We're not going swimming, are we?"

I grinned. "Maybe. If you want."

"Not today, I'm afraid." He did take off his shoes and socks, though. Then he looked at me and said, "Do _you_ want to swim?"

I shrugged. "I kind of do. It's warm out today. But if you don't want to, I don't have to."

"Um… what would you, er, _wear_ when you're swimming?"

I rolled my eyes. Just like any other boy, that was the first thing he thought of. "I'd probably just go in this," I replied. "No, as much as you would like it, you will not get a chance to see me in a bikini."

"_Ahem_, no comment…"

"Oh, yeah. Like you're _that _much different from other boys."

"How am I different?"

I just raised an eyebrow and scrutinized him head to toe. "Do you really want me to start?"

He just laughed breathily and looked away. That silence came back, but this time it was companionable as we sat, listening to the sounds around us. I closed my eyes and let the surprisingly warm breeze of early spring flow over my cheeks as I let my mind wander. About a minute passed before I heard the subtle sounds of Nico beside me, as he subtly slid across the rock surface –– closer to me. I opened my eyes and locked gazes with him. Mischievously, he slid a bit closer –– but his smile was all I saw before he put his bare foot against a loose rock, the rock gave way, and he slid right off the rock and into the water below.

"Nico!" I yelled, whipping off my jacket and preparing to dive in after him. He was splashing like a drowning maniac, but his head was above water and most of his frantic arm motions seemed to be overreacting. "Oh my gods, are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he coughed, "if not a bit damp."

I cocked my head to the side. "Do you want me to come in with you?"

"Sure!" he called. "The water's grea –– oh, gods." His face contorted into a terrified grimace, and he started to splash more desperately. "Cramp –– thirty –– minutes –– after eating –– not –– myth –– "

That was all I heard from him before his head went under.

"NICO!" I screamed as I jumped in. I didn't know how to swim, and I definitely did not know how to save a drowning person, but that did not occur to me at the moment. Once in the water –– which was a good six feet deep –– I tried to keep myself afloat while blindly groping for Nico. I located his hand, and then the rest of his body.

It took all of my strength and then some to swim up to the river bed while holding a half-drowned son of Hades. His aviator's jacket and baggy jeans were hindrances in this case, as they had soaked up more water than sponges and kept that water in, adding about twenty pounds to his total weight. But I managed, and soon we were safe on dry land. Almost.

Nico's face was paler than ever, and his eyes were closed. He had been coughing and spluttering as we came in, but now he was completely still –– deathly still. I lay him on his back and knelt over him, muttering prayers to Apollo and Hades and Poseidon and pretty much every deity I knew that might help us in this case. "Oh gods, Nico," I whispered. "Oh gods, oh gods… oh gods, Nico, talk to me!" By now I was almost screaming, and even shaking his shoulders.

But then he coughed, opened his eyes, smiled, and said in a perfectly normal voice, "I can't believe you fell for it."

The implications of this sank in, and I fell backwards onto my heels. "What?"

"First attempt at a dramatic drowning act," he smirked, sitting up and shaking out his wet hair like a dog. "Must've been good if you fell for it. As for the 'wait thirty minutes after eating before going in the water' myth…" insert triumphant pause, "I thought you would know better, that it is just a myth."

I was speechless. So I just punched him in the arm and strode off to go get my shoes, jacket, and staff.

* * *

We walked back to camp together, still soaking wet. When we came to the point between cabin thirteen and cabin twenty-nine at which we would have to part ways, I said, "I'll walk with you back."

"Why?" he asked.

"In case a certain high-voltage blondie shows up and my staff is needed again," I replied, and without another word Nico complied.

But when he got to his cabin, he said, "Now I'll walk _you _back."

And when we got to mine, I said, "Now I'll walk _you."_

We managed to walk each other seven times before that high-voltage blondie in question appeared, and I had to drag Nico inside cabin twenty-nine before Jason could see him. Nico left my cabin by way of shadow travel.

And not once did we ever mention the kiss, repeat it, or even try.

As far as friendship repairing goes, it was probably my best attempt ever.

* * *

**The Nutella crêpe incident is based off a true story, except that the players in the original incident are different and more in number –– there were five of us trying to get the girl to eat her lunch. And the crêpe really had nothing to do with that; I just put it in because I couldn't remember what exactly it was that my friend was not eating and because Nutella banana crêpes are awesome. Seriously, you gotta try them. AH-MAAAZE-ING! ^_^**

**Please review this fluff fest!**


	12. Chapter 12

**Hey guys! I'm back! Don't freak out!**

**You can thank JstMakeAWish, who nagged me about updating…**

**Sooooo. Down to business. Upon rereading the entire PJO and HoO series (because I FINALLY got the HoO books from the store as mine to keep! Yayz!) I realized some very important things. Plot holes, if you will.**

**ONE. The title was too long. So I changed it. Likey?**

**TWO. Dionysus was not at the camp at the time Saige came; he had been called back to Olympus. So from now on, we'll just pretend that never happened, and Dionysus will be making no other appearances in this fic…**

**THREE. Hades was EXTREMELY out of character. So here, I make amends.**

**FOUR. Saige and Nico look like freaking bobbleheads in the cover art, so I'm taking it down. I'll probably draw a new one when I feel like it, but for now, the cover art is simply my S.**

**Anywho, enjoy this chappy. It's not the camp-wide prank war (sorry, DreamingStars1; I used up all my humor on Dear Fanfiction Writers and Of Party Games and Potty Mouths…) but it's still cute. I thought of it while I was stuck in bed sick a couple weeks ago, and you'll see why.**

**NOT COMPLETELY FLUFF. There are some important things (foreshadowing, if you will) in this chapter.**

* * *

**Chapter 12**

**The God Of Death Makes An Excellent Parenting Counselor**

Four days after the crêpe incident, I awoke with clouds over my head. Figurative clouds, that is. It was one of those times when you're lying in your bed and you're half aware that you're awake but you don't want to be, so you aren't exactly. I really had to pee, but I was too tired to get off my bed. My pillow was too soft and my comforter too fluffy for me to draw the strength to get up and relieve myself elsewhere. So I just held it.

Eventually I managed to get up, clumsily shadow-travel to the girls' bathrooms, do my business, and shadow-travel back to my cabin, just in time for me to promptly pass out again on my bed. My sleep was deep and dreamless and broken only by the rapping of knuckles on my cabin's gilded door.

"Goway," I yelled blearily to the knocker before dropping my head back down on my pillow. My head hurt, my stomach hurt, everything hurt. Well, not hurt exactly, just felt really, really horrible. I just wanted to be left alone.

He came in anyway. Nico poked his shaggy black head into the room, but the grin on his face faded when he saw me still in bed and still in my pajamas. "Saige, you gotta get up sometime."

"Nuh I don'." I smushed my face into my pillow and tried to ignore him.

"Yes you do."

"Wuh time izzit?"

"Seven thirty. PM."

I lifted my head off the pillow and glanced at the digital clock on my bedside table. He was right. I said something intelligent like "Meh" before slamming my face into my pillow again. The bright little numbers made my head swim and I squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could.

"Saige," he said. I could hear him making his way over to my bed. "Let me feel your forehead."

"Nah, I'm good," I said through the pillow, which probably came out more like "Ah I ooh".

"Saige."

Reluctantly I lifted my head, but I stuck out my tongue and didn't open my eyes. I felt his hand on my forehead and jerked back. I'd always known he had cold hands, but I hadn't really ever noticed much because my hands were pretty dang cold too. (Children of the Underworld thing, I guess…) But when it touched against my forehead, they felt like _ice_, literally.

He also recoiled at the touch. "You're burning up."

"Fever?" I asked, cracking open one eyelid.

Nico grimaced. "I think so."

"Probably just allergies," I groaned. My stomach really hurt now, but it wasn't from hunger. I actually didn't feel hungry at all.

"Allergies don't give you a fever."

A shiver ran through me, though I passed it off to being from the coldness of Nico's hand on my skin. "I'm fine," I said, closing my eyes and reaching for my covers. "Just tired, that's all."

"From what?"

"I shadow traveled twice this morning to go to the bathroom."

"That can't be it. You're strong enough to handle that."

"I did the rock climbing wall yesterday."

"You did it last week too. This didn't happen."

"Look, Nico, I'm…ah…glad that you care about me," I said thickly, trying to piece the elusive words together, "but I'm not sick."

"You're sick," he insisted. "I can literally see it. Your life aura's…weird looking. Fuzzy, almost." I knew what he was talking about. Auras were kind of hard to read, but there were two that were instantly identifiable –– the well-named "fuzziness" of sickness and the flickering fade of death.

"I'm not sick," I protested, trying to sit up. I was immediately put back down again by a bubbling, churning sensation in my stomach. Involuntarily I let out a groan. Could he be right?

He reached out and felt my forehead again, and we both recoiled from the unnatural contrast of freezing cold on searing heat. I shivered again as the wave of ice washed over me and trickled through my veins, taking over my body. "I can't be sick," I tried again, reaching for my blankets. "If I had a fever I wouldn't be cold." I drew my thick, fluffy comforter around me, then froze when I saw the concern written on Nico's face. "Right…?"

He frowned. "No."

I sighed and tucked my head in. I was shivering throughout now, but I kept telling myself that I wasn't sick. I simply did not _get_ sick. I had only been actually sick once in my entire lifetime and it had just been a little cold. "I'm just tired and a bit chilly, that's all. I'm fine."

He stood up, holding his hands out in defeat before dropping them to his sides. "Okay, okay." I thought that I had won until he continued, "I'll go get someone from Apollo's cabin."

I threw a pillow at him. "Dude, I'm not sick, okay?"

But as he left, I knew that he was probably right.

* * *

Will Solace touched my skin once and called me sick. I don't know how he knew for sure, but since his dad was the god of medicine, healing, whatever, I decided to take his word for it. Symptoms? Chills, cold sweat, skin hot to the touch, headaches, not hungry even after eighteen hours of eating nothing, and just a feeling of _blah,_ as I so intelligently put it. Diagnosis? A flu.

Well, you could imagine that this didn't make me too happy. A flu? In the summer? Weren't flus a winter thing? Well, apparently not. You could get them any time of the year. This information wasn't exactly accepted by me with a warm welcome either. In fact, I believe my exact wording was "UGH!"

My fingers itched to get a hold on my staff or at least a knife, and my feet kept tapping as they wished to race. But Will gave his firm word: no training for me. None. Nope. I was to stay in bed and rest. He gave me some pills for my headaches and told me to drink a lot of water to keep me hydrated, then he left me alone with Nico.

The impenetrable cold that racked my body with shivers had abated, so I kicked off the covers. I flopped my skinny legs down on the mattress and groaned "UGH!" again, almost kicking Nico in the process.

"Calm down," he said amusedly, flicking my toe. "Come on, it can't be that bad."

"No," I said, lifting my head, "it's worse."

"And how could it be worse?"

I let my head drop and lazily kicked up the foot that he'd been lightly stroking for reasons unexplainable. It had really tickled and I didn't want him finding out another one of my vulnerable spots. "I DON'T KNOW!" I moaned loudly. "Hey, is it me, or is it suddenly super hot in here?"

He stared at me. "It's you."

I blew a raspberry and groped for the huge mug of ice water that Nico had brought for me at Will's request. I tried to prop myself up on my elbow, but my limbs were sore and it took me at least a minute to get up to a manageable position. Nico kept watching intently as I tilted the mug and took a sip. I stared back at him. "Will you stop? It's creeping me out!"

"Stop what?" He was perfectly poker-faced.

"You know," I replied, putting the mug back on my bedside table and waving my free hand in the air, "_that. _Staring at me. You're freaking me out, man!"

He kept staring at me, but now it was with concern. "You really are sick."

I didn't know what he meant by that and I didn't care enough to think about it. A drop of sweat trickled down my nose, born from the unnatural heat that kept running up and down my body. I wiped it away with my finger and tugged at the collar of my oversized black t-shirt. "Hey," I said, "can you get me a tank top or something? This thing is seriously too hot."

He looked really concerned now and I was wondering if maybe _he _was the one who was sick. "Uh…okay?" he said, though it really sounded more like a question as the punctuation so dictates. Casting one more concerned glance towards me, he got up and made his way towards the old-fashioned mahogany chest of drawers where I kept my clothes and stuff. I watched lazily as he opened the top drawer, stared wide-eyed for half a second, then shut it quickly. Okay, it was official. I was really sick. How did I know this? The answer is simple: I wasn't even healthy enough to be embarrassed about Nico looking in my underwear drawer.

He moved onto the second drawer and pulled out a black tank top, then tossing it to me. I caught it clumsily, then just stared at him.

"What?" he asked.

I made a very subtle "turn around and don't look" gesture with my fingers. Begrudgingly he did so, facing the opposite wall. As I was exchanging the t-shirt for the tank top, though, I swore I saw his head moving a little bit, as if to sneak a peek. I threw my t-shirt at him. "Perv."

"What did I do?" he cried innocently as the t-shirt found its target on his head. He didn't turn around, though. Maybe I was just paranoid.

"Never mind. You're good." I quickly adjusted what needed to be adjusted of the tank top and fell backwards onto my mattress again. Then I grimaced and groaned. My stomach seriously didn't agree with that sudden jolt of movement.

"You okay?" Nico inquired, sitting back down on my bed in his former position.

"Sure. If you count 'feeling like cow crap' as okay."

"Then no."

"Just leave me alone, Death Breath."

I was one of the few people who could get away with calling him names. Anyone else would have found themselves at the pointy end of his sword. He just gave me the pouty lip. "All I tried to do," he said, his voice wobbly and choked, "was try to keep you company! And what do you do? You…you push me away!"

A tear slipped out of his eyes, which were surprisingly big and glittering in the dim light of the torches and lava lamps. I threw another pillow at him. "You're not pulling anything, Nico."

He brushed away the tear and all sadness fled from his face, leaving the slightly annoyed indifference that was the norm. "I got free meals that way a couple times. It worked better when I was littler."

"They must have been really stupid people."

"Oh, they were."

I closed my eyes. I wasn't as hot now; it actually seemed like my fever had died down. "Seriously, though. I'm tired. Go annoy Annabeth or something."

I could almost sense him shrugging. I definitely felt the bed shift as his weight lifted off, then heard the sounds of his shoes scuffing against the marble floors as he made his way to the door. "Okay. You sure you'll be all right?"

"Yeah, _Mom," _I mumbled.

"Now remember to stay hydrated," he said, imitating Will but with a voice an octave higher and with an unexplainable Southern accent.

"Shut up."

He did, then slipped out the door and closed it behind him.

* * *

I dreamed of my dad.

He was sitting in a black chair in what looked like a waiting room of an office or something, except that everything was black or tarnished silver. I instantly knew where he was –– the anteroom to Hades's main office, where the god of the Underworld went through all the paperwork when he was bored enough to do the job he was supposed to do anyway. It was exactly as it had been since I'd last broken in a year ago, except that it was strangely hot, probably due to my fever.

Thanatos was in his full Mist-free glory –– black tunic, black cape with the gold clasp, Stygian iron scythe, and wings. The beautiful wings which I really wished I had inherited were hiked up so that they didn't touch the low back of the chair as he leaned against it, scrolling through something on his iPad. He was probably playing Angry Birds again, I mused when I realized that (1) the iPad was turned sideways, (2) his swiping finger wasn't going the directions it was supposed to go when he was working, and (3) he had on the half-crazy smile that he said I got on the one occasion he let me play it. If I wasn't there as an invisible astral projection, I would have rolled my eyes.

Nearby, a ghost sat at a reception desk, trying to make herself look busy by playing with paperwork. Her spectral hair was pulled up in a bun and glasses rested on her small nose. Her face was young and pretty even though I somehow knew that she'd been here for over three hundred years. The little sign on the front of her desk read _Priscilla Chevalier _and underneath that _Secretary._

_Who names their kid Priscilla?_ I wondered.

Then Priscilla herself looked up. She stared in my direction as if she saw me, then her eyes met mine and I knew that she did. Subtly, she brought one slender spectral finger to her slightly smiling lips. I nodded and she turned away as if she'd never seen me.

"Mister Thanatos," she said, "Lord Hades will see you now."

Oh? So it was "Mister" Thanatos and "Lord" Hades? Interesting. Dad didn't seem to mind though; he just slipped the iPad into the vast folds of his chiton where it vanished. Briskly he stood up, nodded once to Priscilla, and pushed open the doors that led to Hades's office.

On a hunch, I willed my astrally projected body forward and after my dad. I jumped a bit as the doors slid shut behind me, but I regained my composure and looked around. Everything was big like it should have been for beings the size of the gods, but somehow this didn't seem to bother me and my sense of dimensions in the dream. It was almost like I myself was the size of a god. Or like everything was human size. In any case, it felt so strangely normal that it felt abnormal.

Hades was sitting at a mahogany desk, hunched over a scroll and writing with a black calligraphy pen. Thanatos stopped in front of the desk and bowed slightly, just lowering his head. "Lord Hades."

"Thanatos," said Hades flatly, not looking up. "What's wrong this time?" He didn't sound very enthusiastic about it.

"Hades," said Dad again, "we need to talk."

The god of the dead set down his pen and looked up, meeting my dad's hard amber eyes with his cold onyx ones. "What is it?"

"Family matters," replied Thanatos. This was where I started mentally groaning.

The expression on Hades's face lit with a strange mix of interest and dread and he stood up quickly. "Is this about the Thanem girl? Because if you're willing to talk about what happened with her –– "

"This is not entirely about Saige," interrupted Thanatos calmly. "It's about Nico di Angelo."

I moved from groaning to cursing.

If it was possible for Hades's face to go any paler, it did. I swore his skin was actually glowing a bit. "Wh –– what?"

"This," said Thanatos, his eyes filling with the same manic fire that I'd seen in them as he was playing Angry Birds, "is about your son. Didn't you hear me?"

Hades opened and closed his gasping mouth like a fish out of water. "I –– " It took him a few seconds to compose himself, and by the time he did, his face had gone from milk white to ashy gray, which I knew was bad. When his face went gray, he was really, really mad. And if this wasn't enough to warn me and Dad, his eyes gave it all away –– they were cold as ice and literally sent a frigid spike driving into my soul even with the brief glimpse of them I got. "Do not dare speak his name."

"Whose name?" Now Dad was being reckless. I wanted to yell to him to stop, but I had no voice in a dream and even if I had, I was too frozen to move. "You mean, the name of your son, whom you _beat_ when he resisted your orders to kidnap _my_ daughter?"

"How dare you question my auth –– "

"Hades." The foolish impulsiveness was gone from Thanatos's voice now, replaced with that no-nonsense voice that he used with me and rowdy hellhounds. "I don't care about who's whose boss right now; this isn't about work."

"Then what is it about?" Hades had also changed tones, slipping from the bellowing rage that was more fit for Zeus to a more casual and more irritated scowl that I'd been on the receiving end of probably as many times as Dad had.

"It's about family," said Thanatos calmly. "Now, it's true that Saige knows about both camps, but the time is soon drawing when that will no longer be of any importance. And yes, she may have broken a few things on her last few visits –– "

"She destroyed seventeen guards and one of Persephone's mirrors!"

" –– but I promise I will pay for those as soon as I get a raise. So now it's time to just let it all go, forgive her, and work on amending the other problem."

"You'll pay for them when you get a raise, which is paid by _me? _How does that even make sense?"

"Take a joke, Hades, take a joke. Now, _to get back on subject…_we've dealt with one of the children; let's focus on the other."

I sniffed silently and shivered. No one had, quote on quote, "dealt with" me. My dad knew better than to try to discipline me. Mom had been the only one who could, and that had been long before I discovered my powers.

Hades let out a long, drawn-out sigh and collapsed back into his office chair. "Fine. What has the oh-so-experienced father of _one _have to say about parenting?" Sarcasm dripped from each word.

"That you're doing it wrong," replied Thanatos stiffly, also sitting down in the chair across the desk.

"And how, please tell…?"

"For one, it's a good idea not to threaten your kids when they do things wrong or don't want to do what you tell them to."

"He was deliberately disobeying me after I warned him of the consequences! I was simply carrying out my word that he would be punished!"

"For _two," _Dad continued as if the interruption had never happened, "it's an even better idea not to punish them in ways that are too harsh. Don't starve him or slap him. Take away his video games for a week or ground him for a couple days, but don't physically harm him. Ever. That builds up a grudge and a hatred faster, and if that happens…" Thanatos tutted, something that I thought I'd never hear him do. "It won't be pretty."

Hades's face had gone whiter than white again. "A hatred?" His voice was hollow and almost shocked. "You mean…he hates me?"

"He might not yet," replied Thanatos. "He definitely fears you already. You shouldn't want to be feared, you should want to be respected. You're not going to get any respect by hitting him."

"But –– "

"The only reason he hates you, if in the case that he does, is because he thinks you hate him."

"I don't hate him! I'm proud of him! Didn't you see what we did together in the battle for Manhattan? That was –– "

"Months ago. A lot can change in a few months. He's probably forgotten about that already. He only thinks about how much his father is disappointed in him because he's not Bianca, because he didn't want to betray another friend."

Hades was silent. I saw something in his eyes that I thought I'd never see. Pain. He sank against the back of his chair, then lowered his head, hiding those agonized, fear-laced black orbs from my view. "I –– I guess I never thought of that."

Thanatos let a freezing, nearly palpable silence drift between them for a few endless moments. I suppose I should have been shaking with fear, because when my dad went silent like that, things were bad, but I felt strangely warm and content. Then he said in a voice like stone, "Well, now you have plenty of time to keep thinking."

Then he stood up and vanished into a swirl of shadows, and I woke up to a faint clicking sound and a warmth around my shivering bare shoulders.

* * *

It was the kind of awakening that happens only to your mind, then to your eyes –– not the kind in the movies where you jolt awake and sit up at the same time. Such a feat is impossible for someone who's actually tired. And tired I was, yet I was also awake. I had awoken just in time to see the door click quietly shut behind an anonymous person who I hadn't even gotten a glimpse of.

Inside, I was still shivering. The chills were back, apparently, which meant that my fever was spiking again. But around me was a soft, warm _something _that felt strangely familiar.

Blinking my eyes, which were blurred by unexplainable tears, I looked down and found that my covers had been drawn back up over me and that someone had draped a battered aviator's jacket over my shoulders.

* * *

**Review?**


	13. Chapter 13

**Okayokayokay. WHOOOOOOAAAAA RIORDAN. Okay, let's pretend that the revealing of Nico's true…er…sexuality never happened, and that he's totally straight. Okay?**

**I've come up with a further plot line and have decided that this won't lap too much over into the events of HoH anyway, so we're good.**

…

**I'm sorry. I can't do it. This might not be as good as you guys expect, because you would not believe how much page 292 rocked my world, and not in a good way either. Grrrr…I swear, I was about to kill someone. Seriously.**

**But please, if you support it, let's not bring that argument in, okay? It'll get ugly and if it gets too ugly then I might have to stop writing this. And we don't want that. Thanks.**

**Mystichawk apparently owns the term "lovie dovies". Rick Riordan apparently owns PJO. I just own Saige.**

* * *

**Chapter 13**

**We Have Lovie Dovies**

Whether it was a coincidence, something bizarrely divine, or just my mind playing tricks on me, I never found out. But after Nico had silently surprised me with his gift, I started feeling better.

My fever died down –– this time for good –– and soon I was able to stand up without my stomach churning. I still didn't have much of an appetite, but at least I was able to eat a bowl of chicken noodle soup without grimacing. I wore his jacket the entire time and never took it off, much to Will Solace's dismay as he helped me. (I think the fourteen-year-old son of Apollo might have had a little crush on me, hence being jealous of you-know-who, but then again, it might have been just my mind playing tricks on me for the gazillionth time. Most likely it was the latter.)

Well, by the time I actually did feel better and good enough to shadow travel to his cabin, it was ten in the morning. Nico would probably be asleep. But since my weird nap schedule had seriously thrown off my already-odd circadian rhythm, I didn't particularly care. And if he was asleep, well, I could be quiet when I wanted to.

But when I materialized behind his cabin and slipped in by way of the front door (duh; what else would I have used?) I found that he wasn't asleep. In fact, he wasn't even in the cabin. Cabin thirteen was as desolate as a tomb and almost as cheery. His sword was gone, as was his backpack. So he'd gone somewhere.

Even without the note I might have been able to figure out where he'd gone. But, in case that I didn't, he had left a note anyway. It was written on a piece of ripped notebook paper and had been left on his pillow. Sitting down on the sloppily made bed, I unfolded the note. It took me several tries, but eventually my dyslexic eyes managed to make out something like this in Nico's black scrawl:

_S,_

_Visiting J to check up on H._

_I should be back tomorrow around 3._

_I didn't want to wake you up to tell you._

_N_

_P.S. I hope you're feeling better. You looked cold._

"Tomorrow" had been crossed out and respelled four times. I wasn't sure which one was right, but I got the gist anyway. He had gone to Jupiter –– Camp Jupiter, duh –– to check up on Hazel and he'd be back at three. I was guessing he meant probably three in the morning, not the afternoon, because three in the afternoon was when he'd usually be sleeping. But then again, he could last a pretty long time without sleep…you know what, forget it. My mind was still kind of fuzzy from being sick. Thinking was not something I should be doing at the time.

Smiling wryly, I folded the note back up and tucked it into my pocket. I gazed around cabin thirteen, taking in the black stuffed dogs on the bed, the McDonald's Happy Meal toys on the shelves, the Stygian iron weapons, and the flickering green torches. Green. It had always been his favorite color. I never really thought to ask why. Personally, my favorite was purple, like the deep, dark violet of the sky after a sunset, but green was quickly moving up on the favorite color scale.

I guess it, just like pretty much everything else about me these days, was because of Nico.

Styx. Why did being a demigod girl with a crush have to be _so infernally hard?!_

* * *

"Because typically," said Lacy upon me repeating the question aloud, "we girls have very strong emotions. It's part of how we are, how we're hardwired if you will." I knew that Lacy had a serious and very secret crush on Leo Valdez, hence the tech-speak. "Aphrodite blessed us so that women tend to have stronger emotions than men."

"You mean, cursed us," I remarked, a bit uncomfortable in the colorful environment of cabin ten. Not a shadow in sight. I still didn't know why we hadn't used my cabin instead.

"Well, yeah," admitted the daughter of Aphrodite. "I guess it could be a curse sometimes. But really, it's a blessing."

I sniffed and flopped myself down on her bed, letting my ever-present staff fall beside me. "Yeah, right. Maybe for you."

"Well, why not for you?" asked Lacy, genuinely confused.

Sighing, I closed my eyes. This was going to be difficult. Here I was, the daughter of Death, talking to the daughter of Love. I would bet my last drachma that she had never had to scrounge food out of a trash can or sleep where people would usually wait for a bus. She probably hadn't even had to fight anything more dangerous than a single dracaena in her life! She didn't have to deal with weaknesses, fears, pain, and death on a regular basis. She just sat around and looked pretty. There was plenty of room for romantic escapades. But in this life, _my _life –– love could be a curse. Your crush could at any time be your betrayer, your ally, your dueling partner, your rescuer, or your lifeline. "You don't understand, Lacy."

She was quiet, obviously sensing the bitterness inflected in the words. I could almost feel her gaze tracing a path down the scar on my forehead. Yes, I had a scar on my forehead. It was the one that I liked to call my Potter scar because it was in the same place as The Boy Who Lived's scar, except that it was shaped like a crescent moon instead of a lightning bolt and had been dealt by some crazy mugger/rapist mortal with a knife instead of an evil wizard lord. (I'd won the fight and kept my virginity, thank gods.)

"You're right," she said quietly. "I don't think I do."

A silence drifted over us. Lacy's cabin mates were at the camp-wide volleyball tournament, probably just looking attractive from the sidelines and distracting the volleyball players. Lacy hadn't gone; she, along with several others and me, had also come down with a flu. Hence me and her sitting there in cabin ten as a companionable silence drifted over us.

But when does a silence ever go unbroken? This time it was broken by the sound of screeching laughter and the cabin's door banging open. I sat up. Either the Furies were after me, or…

"Drew!" yelped Lacy, also sitting up straight.

Drew Tanaka sauntered in like she owned the camp, her perfectly shaped mouth curved in an ugly grin. "Well, well, well," she sneered, turning her glare towards me. "Look what the dogs dragged in."

Okay, sure, I know I might not have been very pretty, and I knew I definitely looked out of place among the pink and white of the cabin in my black ripped jeans, skull and crossbones t-shirt, dirty sneakers, and Nico's battered jacket. My thick hair was a tangled mess and I knew for a fact that my eyes were underlined with their typical sleepless shadows. But I met her gaze without flinching. I'd seen pizza guys who were more intimidating than her. "Wow, you're right," I replied evenly, scanning her scantily clad body up and down with a raised eyebrow. "It's a very interesting specimen."

Lacy clamped a hand over her mouth to hide her smile. Drew's scowl grew deeper. "Get out."

"Oh, trust me, I'm not willing to stay," I said distastefully, hopping off Lacy's bed and bouncing my staff off my shoe idly. "It's altogether way too cheerful among you strange peoples."

"So says the emo graverobber." Okay, now that was just low. I didn't deny that I was emo, but if I was a graverobber, Chiron was a Cyclops.

"At least I don't look like Iris just threw up on me." I countered her sickly sweet smile with my devil's grin.

She sniffed, rolled her eyes, and tossed her chestnut hair over her shoulder. "Just get out."

I curtsied sarcastically and pivoted on my heel to leave. But as Drew strode off to the bathroom (probably to fix her flawless makeup) and Lacy watched me intently, I flipped a quick bird to the older girl. Drew saw nothing, but Lacy's mouth dropped open.

Then it turned into a smile, and I nodded to the twelve-year-old before leaving cabin ten. Ah, what a bad influence I could be on the younger children.

* * *

Somewhere during the night –– before three in the morning, definitely –– I sneaked out of camp and into the forest. I wanted to go to my spot; the pollen levels were rather low that night and I just needed a bit of quiet time outside. I wore Nico's jacket, as I had been doing for the past twenty-so hours, and took nothing but my staff and a dagger. What? I was paranoid, okay? Even though monsters had a tendency to either not see me at night or completely avoid me altogether, I still needed some way to protect myself.

I didn't use shadow travel; I didn't want to wear myself out too much. Which was probably how I saw Nico before he saw me. He was sitting on the rock outcropping with his back to me, his legs dangling over the edge. He was wearing only jeans, his sword on his chain belt, and a black t-shirt, which revealed those pale, slender arms that almost glowed in the light of the full moon. There was a gentle breeze, which ruffled his raven hair and ––

Omigods, what in Gaea's green earth was I _thinking?!_

Shivering, I shook away these treasonous thoughts. No. I did not love Nico di Angelo. Sure, I liked him a lot, maybe a bit of a crush, but as a friend! A symbolic brother, maybe, but not a boyfriend! We were only _thirteen,_ for Zeus's sake!

I could almost _feel_ Lacy's grin and Aphrodite's eager smile. Maybe they were watching me. Maybe Lacy was standing right next to me, an invisible astral projection, and I'd never even know it. Maybe they were _both _standing next to me, chanting "Admit it! Admit it!" Maybe I was just paranoid. Maybe I should turn back. Maybe I should have accepted that chocolate bar that Lacy had offered earlier. Why had I turned it down again? I was really hungry now.

I shook away this thought too. How had I gotten so distracted? _Shut up,_ I told my insistent stomach. _I'll feed you later._

Taking a deep breath, I took a few steps closer. Nico still hadn't seen or heard me. I moved even closer, each step echoing in my ears. Then, about five feet away from him, I froze. His body was literally swaying. A tiny moan slipped out of his mouth before he fell limply backwards.

My heart leapt into my throat, and on the spur of the moment I dove forward to catch him. Somehow I did, and suddenly I found myself staring into Nico's peaceful, sleeping face.

Peaceful. I had never thought of Nico di Angelo as peaceful. I had never had the opportunity to. But here he was, his head resting in my arms and lap, and there the word was, lingering in my still somewhat shocked mind. In sleep his face was much more relaxed, making him look years younger, though it was still obvious where the skin was tight from malnourishment. I expected his eyelids to fly open at any moment, but he was out cold. Poor kid. Knowing him, I guessed that he'd been shadow traveling all day without sleep.

I found my fingers gently and subconsciously playing with a lock of his hair, twirling it around before letting it go and starting over. It wasn't too greasy or tangled, which it usually was. In fact, now it was actually quite smooth, almost soft, like a baby crow's feather. Had he actually washed it? I bent down and sniffed. Yup, smelled like strawberries. He knew I liked strawberry scented shampoo. Had he washed his hair…for me?

A small, involuntary smile rose to my lips. "You, Nico di Angelo," I whispered, letting his full name roll across my tongue, "are something else."

You can probably guess what happened next, so I'll just not say.

No?

Okay, fine. I'll admit it.

For the second time ever, I kissed him.

It wasn't just a little quick cheek peck like the first, but a long, drawn out meeting of both of our cold lips. And when they did, it was beautiful. A tingle of electricity that grew to a brilliant crackle and then faded to a glowing fuzz ran through me, through _us. _My hands moved around his shoulders and held him as I closed my eyes and let myself savor the inside, hidden warmth of him and me.

And then I felt his lips shift and instantly I knew that he was kissing me back.

Gently, I drew back and allowed my eyes to open. Instantly I met his, then found that I couldn't draw away, my gaze locked in those twin pools of black. No, they weren't entirely black. In the light of the moon I could barely see a few threads of deep brown lacing the black irises that usually blended into the pupil.

He blinked slowly, then smiled. "Thanks, Saige," left his lips before his eyes fluttered closed again and he fell asleep again.

I just stayed there, frozen with him in my arms. I could almost hear Aphrodite squealing. Well, we couldn't just sit like this all night. As carefully as I could manage, I lifted his limp body off the ground and adjusted so I was holding him…how shall I say…bridal style, perhaps. His head was hanging down in a very unnatural position, but there was little I could do about that. He wouldn't be in the position for long.

Focusing on the words _cabin thirteen, Camp Half-blood _in my mind, I stepped into the shadows.

We emerged inside said cabin without an excessively clumsy landing, which was surprising seeing as I am pretty bad at coming out of shadow travel gracefully and silently, especially while holding a hundred-pound son of Hades in my arms. In any case, it was successful and Nico did not wake up.

I laid him down on his bed and proceeded in taking off his shoes, belt, and sword. He stirred and unconsciously reached for blankets to snuggle into, then drew his bony hands in towards his chest when he found that he was sleeping on top of the covers. Carefully I removed the aviator's jacket from my shoulders and wrapped it around him just as he had done for me yesterday.

I spent a few moments gently playing with his hair, staring into his sleeping face, and smiling before I got up to leave. Maybe I would have stayed longer if I had known what would happen.

But, since I didn't know what would happen and only then knew that I had left my staff at the spot by the river, I left.

* * *

**See? Lovie dovies.**

**For the sake of this fic, that part of HoH and whatever rest of it that balances on…**_**that **_**piece of canon (I wouldn't know –– I have to admit that I threw the book across the room and lost further motive to continue after page 293) does not exist. Magically.**

**Updates will be sporadic. Still haven't come up with a plot line.**

**Wait! Don't help me!**

**I got this.**

**I've got a couple evil plot bunnies in mind… *evil grin***

**Review pwetty pwease. :)**


	14. Chapter 14

**Just finished reading HoH.**

**Then I got PMS.**

**This evil plot bunny is the result.**

**It may be short, but it's lethal and it will affect the rest of the story.**

**…**

**Brace yourself.**

* * *

**Chapter 14**

**Awkwardness Reigns Supreme**

He vanished again.

I didn't even have time to say goodbye or even see him after that night. He just left. No note, no warning, nothing.

I wasn't too worried or anything. He was more of a "free spirit", as Annabeth had so fondly put it. He had probably just forgotten something back at Camp Jupiter and had to get it back.

I didn't see him again for _three weeks, two days, and seventeen hours._

And by then, I was plenty worried.

* * *

Of course he couldn't just normally come back with a hug and a greeting of hello, how have you been doing, I'm sorry I left for nearly a month without telling you, can you kiss me again and forgive and forget. Of course, because nothing about Nico di Angelo was normal.

It had been a long, long day. I'd trained against some of the Ares kids that day and Clarisse had beaten me to a pulp. Not purposely, though; she was actually a nice girl once you got past her initially trying to pulverize you. And then I had almost killed a half-dozen people during canoeing races –– those naiads _still _had something out for me –– which had concluded with Chiron nicely suggesting that I should probably avoid canoeing for a while. After these escapades and more, I was actually considering going to bed early.

After the campfire sing-along and marshmallow roasting, during which I had nearly caught Drew's head on fire (not purposefully; I wasn't _that _cruel) and inadvertently caused a very confusing screaming match between the camp's two charmspeakers, I was too lazy to walk back to cabin twenty-nine. So I just leaned back and fell into the shadows.

The trip was short, exhilarating, and sweet, and I stepped out into my dim cabin. I arrived with my head unintentionally turned away from the bed and facing my chest of drawers. Drowsily, I leaned my staff against the wall, yawned, and prepared to exchange my dirty black t-shirt for one of my cleaner pajama tops.

And halfway through taking off said shirt, I realized that Nico was sitting on my bed and staring at me with his mouth half open.

It was the king of awkward moments. No, not king. Supreme emperor, maybe. Something bigger than a king, though. I don't really remember much of what happened right after it, the shock was so much and it happened so fast –– and I can guarantee that Nico would say the same –– but what I do remember is yanking my t-shirt back down, striding over to my bed, and punching him in the face.

I think I hit him harder than I should have. He tumbled off my bed, a book spilling out of his lap. My journal. I snatched up the black-covered book, almost disbelieving what I was seeing.

"You…were reading…my _journal?" _My voice grew higher with every word until it was nearly a shriek.

Rubbing his jaw, Nico staggered to his feet. "Um, OW!" he said indignantly, glaring at me.

The second he stood straight up, I whacked him upside the head with the journal in question. He'd had a growth spurt in a month so I needed to reach up a couple more inches, but it worked in my favor seeing as it allowed my journal a split second more to gain maximum momentum. "How COULD you?!"

"Look, I can explain –– " he tried, his cheeks red –– though whether the redness was from shame, desperation, blunt force trauma, or all three I didn't know. The punch to the side of his face had reopened a partially healed scar near his right eye that hadn't been there before, but in my pain and rage I didn't fully see the trickle of blood that carved its scarlet path down his porcelain skin.

"Explain what?" I shot. "It's the first time I see you in, like, a MONTH, and what do I find you doing? Reading my private journal, which I made you swear NEVER to touch!"

"I was coming to see you! You weren't in here, and I saw your journal lying open on your bed, and I might have seen my name…I wanted to know –– "

"You saw your name?"

Hesitantly, he nodded.

And with that simple head movement, something inside me snapped. I don't know what rage came over me, but it would undo everything that we'd worked so hard to mend since his betrayal. "That should have been the reason you chose NOT to read it!" I yelled, my fingers balling into fists. "It's one thing to kidnap me, tease me, try to kiss me, and then _actually _kiss me, but it's another to invade my personal thoughts!"

He was almost on the verge of tears. "Look, I'm sorry, okay?"

But I, even though I too was nearly sobbing with him, would show no mercy today. "Sorry?" My voice rose in pitch and volume with each syllable. "_Sorry? _You, Nico di Angelo, have been nothing but a hindrance and a problem and a _thief _since the day I met you."

"What? I –– "

"You took away my pride when you brought me to a place where everyone judges me by who my father is. You took away my dignity when you kidnapped me and threw me into some gods-forbidden cell in the Underworld. You took away my freedom when you made me realize how much I couldn't stand it when you weren't around, and how badly I wanted to leave when you were."

He was silent, and it was only after the words had left my mouth that I realized their implications. "Wh…what?"

"I liked you, okay?" I snapped. My eyes were loathing and colder than ice as I said it. "You were my only friend in years. I _trusted_ you." A tear slipped down my cheek and I gritted my teeth in anger and frustration. "I _loved _you."

For a few moments there was nothing on his face. He said nothing, and when he did, his voice was quiet. "Liked. Loved. You used past tense."

Any other time, I would have been proud of the kid for knowing his grammar. Now, I was just too angry. But no longer would I shout and scream –– this was a different kind of anger, the quiet, cold kind. One of the worst kinds, and definitely the most effective.

I lowered my head, tightened my fists, and said one word. "Go."

He was silent for quite a while. "What?"

"Go," I repeated, looking up. "Get out of my cabin. Get out of my life. Go and never, _ever_ come back."

My words were quiet but firm. Nico stepped back once, his pale face frozen in shock. Then he blinked, shook his head, turned, and dove into the shadows.

For an immeasurable amount of time I stood there as gods knew what swirled through my enraged, confused, tired mind.

That was when all the words –– his and mine –– came rushing back to me in an overpowering wave, and I dropped to my knees as I started to cry.

The only true friend I had was gone, but that wasn't the worst part of it.

The worst part of it was that I had forced him to leave.

* * *

**Ah, the life and death of Saigico…**

**AAAAAGGGGHHHH! I'M SO SORRY! I PROMISE, I'LL MAKE THIS WORK! I KNOW WHAT TO DO! T_T**

…

**Every time I read one of your guys' reviews saying how much you loved what I was doing with Saigico, I cried.**

**You can cry too, but don't kill me. Please.**


	15. Chapter 15

**For the record, this will not intrude on recorded canon.**

**So there will be no "Saige magically appearing on the Argo II and drastically affecting chapters 1-30 or whatever chapter numbers they are". She will only appear in what is not recorded –– the parts where Riordan failed to provide us a POV of the characters involved. Capiche?**

* * *

**Chapter 15**

**I Am Cooler Than Batman**

I saw him a couple times afterwards.

We never spoke, barely even looked at each other. Sometimes, after he turned away, I would peek out at him from behind my unruly, overgrown bangs, longing to rush up to him and apologize but always too cowardly to do so. Once he met my eyes, but we both turned away.

Neither of us wanted to take that first step.

So we didn't.

* * *

Gods knew how many days passed –– I no longer counted. I threw myself at training with a new, angry vigor, pushing myself until I dropped off my feet. And when I wasn't training, I spent my time in my room, sleeping my guilt away or just sitting there in the darkness, thinking about everything except the one thing I should have been.

I became cold and distant, even more so than before. I think Lacy and the other Aphrodite girls sensed why, but they said nothing because if they tried, I would just snap at them. I acquired a bad habit of sneaking out of camp by way of shadow travel and not returning for a day or so. I would go to graveyards around the country and watch the funerals from the shadows, wondering if my dad was also watching. I tried to contact him several times but to no avail; all I ever got in the Iris Messages was his voicemail.

This did nothing to alleviate my pain and anger. It just fanned the flames. I hated my dad, I hated Nico, and especially I hated myself. I felt horrible about what I had done to my only true friend. He wasn't one to have many friends either –– no, scratch out the m –– _any _friends, and I had stolen the one he had away from him. And Thanatos wasn't doing anything, no matter how hard I prayed.

I had reasons beside Nico, though. Hades no, I was _not _going to go all Bella Swan just because he left me. I'm not that weak. But this was what my mother would call a lethal mixture –– anger, guilt, loneliness, and female hormones.

Anger, because of me, because of Nico, because of Dad, because of those who didn't care, because of those who did care but not in the way that made me feel it. Everyone seemed to leave me at one point or another, but did I care? No! Was I lying to myself? Yes, but at this point in my life I'd never admit it.

Guilt, because I knew what Nico's life was like and I _knew _that one friend could be the difference between life and death, good and evil, sanity and totally losing it. I'd walked the fine line between them in the years I was alone, and I know he had too. And now we were both back to where we'd started.

Loneliness, because even in a camp of people just like me, I'd always be the outcast. Living death, that's what I was. Just the impossible hybrid in a world of impossibles –– except that I didn't just cross the boundary of mortal and god, but of life and death. To put it simply: _I wasn't supposed to exist and every time they looked at me, I knew it._

Female hormones, because of the obvious. Any more details I am reluctant to reveal, though you could probably guess.

Spring turned to summer. Campers flooded in as school let out, and I spent more time than ever trying to avoid their stares. I had never fit in. I refused to wear the bright orange camp t-shirt and instead wore my black tee and frayed shorts, mostly because shadow traveling is really hard in bright clothes but also because the dark colors matched my typical bad moods. These bad moods grew more and more frequent as Drew and some of the meaner kids grew nastier towards me, the sensible people grew warier of me, and I myself just grew colder. To the first group, I just turned my back and said nothing. To the second group, I did the same. At least the latter had the brains to recognize that at any moment, I could snap.

Then, about a week after the initial influx of campers, I met _them._

* * *

I had snuck out again after lights-out and had just been lingering in the woods on that night that I met them. I tried to avoid my special place –– for a long time, my brain kept referring to it as _our _special place and unfortunately I knew who the other person was –– and instead just climbed random trees or sat on the giant pile of random rocks that everyone in camp seemed to want to avoid for no apparent reason.

For a long time I just sat there on said pile of rocks, looking up at the stars in the black sky and listening to the monsters growling in the woods. Usually they left me alone. The aura of death around me, which had intensified in recent times, actually worked in my favor sometimes. And when they didn't leave me alone, I would roll my eyes, freeze them, and send them back to Tartarus where they belonged.

I heard a buzzing noise and looked down to see a mosquito land on my bare arm. I didn't slap it. Instead I watched as it stuck its needlelike mouth into my skin, froze for a second, then shriveled up and died. I let out a dry bark of laughter as I felt the tiny life force being drawn to mine and used to heal the little red dot on my arm. It wasn't well known that the blood of children of death gods was lethal to small organisms when consumed. Sadly this did not apply to larger organisms.

My usual scowl returned to my face as I flicked the tiny dead insect off my arm. But just as I did, I heard the shouting.

Confused and slightly annoyed, I looked up. The shouts weren't coming from anywhere near here, I knew at once. Definitely from outside the camp boundaries. So how could I hear them?

_Just go, _said a voice in my head that sounded vaguely like my dad's.

So, slightly annoyed, I did. I didn't know where I was going or why I was going there, but the shadows seemed to guide me as I melted into them and felt myself being whisked along their paths. I prayed that they would bring me to the right place and I wouldn't get another free trip to that German coffeehouse. They had had some pretty good coffee, but mortals were weirded out so easily that it made me laugh.

I found myself on top of Half-Blood Hill, right underneath Thalia's pine. Sometimes I wondered if it was named after _the _Thalia, who wasn't really on good terms with me after our last meeting, but it was no time to wonder about that now. Because in the valley behind the hill, the valley that was unprotected by the camp boundaries, was chaos.

Well, that might have been a bit of an exaggeration. Two kids, one of them large and hulking, the other tiny and skinny, were surrounded by about a dozen dracaenae. And if I wasn't mistaken, they were the same ones who had chased me through Central Park the day before I came to Camp Half-blood. There was an unconscious man lying between the two kids –– a satyr, by the looks of him. The monsters were advancing and licking their chops.

So I did the heroic, brave, stupid thing. I drew my dagger, gripped it in my left hand and my staff in my right, yelled a wordless battle cry, and charged down the hill to meet the monsters in battle.

See? Stupid.

Well, let me amend that. I didn't really charge. Maybe at first, but I tripped halfway down the steep hill and went tumbling the rest of the way. I managed to not impale myself with my own dagger and kind of sort of turned the impromptu somersaulting into an actual somersault, somehow ending up on my feet and with all of my body parts intact. The two boys and all of the dracaenae were staring at me. Not the satyr, of course, who was still unconscious and mumbling something about bad bean burritos.

The monsters recovered first. One hissed and slithered towards me with surprising speed for someone with snake feet, but I twirled my staff and slashed at her with the jagged tip. The enchanted crystal sliced a tiny wound, no larger than a papercut, in her cheek, but she moved no more, frozen in time like Kronos himself had touched her. Following the staff strike in quick succession, my dagger plunged into the monster's unmoving middle and she disintegrated into a pile of violet-tinted black dust.

Two others held up spears and came at me from opposite directions. The one behind me I took care of by twirling my staff in such a way as to catch her spear on the shaft of my staff and twist it out of her taloned hands, leaving her unarmed. A quick stab with my dagger to her middle and it was over for the second monster, leaving me to face the third, then the fourth, fifth, sixth…well, I think you get the picture.

Things started to slow down for me, like they tend to do when I am fighting, but in a good way. My senses sharpened. My reflexes became a blend of instinctive and raw skill. I seemed to be able to take everything in, process it, and calculate a proper response in less than a second. The surviving monsters, which numbered about five by now, seemed to figure out that if they were going to die, they should die with full bellies. They started slithering towards the two boys and the satyr.

_No. _I would not let them die. I didn't know either of them, but I wouldn't let anyone die. Dunno what it was, maybe some ancient hero-instinct awakening in the villain's heart, but whatever it was, it got the job done. Some dark center of power inside me, buried deep in my soul and knit within the very fabric of my being, rushed through my veins and burned bright in my eyes. I felt a tugging sensation in my gut and instinctually I channeled that power through my left hand and into the Stygian iron dagger, pointing the blade at the ground.

And before the monsters could reach the three victims, a hand stuck itself out of the ground between the three and the five.

I had only time to witness a skinny, pale figure clawing its way out of the ground before the world went fuzzy, then faded to black.

* * *

Now, let me explain something to you real quick before we get to the part where I wake up. Thanatos is technically not the god of the dead –– that would be Hades. He is the god of _death, _as in the process of bringing souls to the Underworld. But since he has quite an influence on the dead and things of the Underworld in general, I have a weaker version of a child of Hades's powers. Not so much geokinesis –– trying to do things like summon bars of gold from the ground or impressive spires of black rock would either not work or kill me –– but necrokinesis isn't that hard if I have Stygian iron on hand. After all, it's the metal from hell. It has more uses than just stabbing people.

I hadn't had too many reasons to practice the former of the skills over the years –– most monsters that were drawn to my aura were easily enough taken care of with my dagger and my staff –– but the few times I did had ended rather strangely. Once I blacked out for a few days until some random mortal found me lying in an alley with dry bones all around me, forcing them to call the cops. (I awoke in a holding cell and only got out when a Lastrygonian giant tore the prison's roof off in an attempt to get his little hell-sent snack out.)

The second time I lost the first half of my life's memories, which were only returned when I bugged my dad to get them back. The third time I hadn't gone unconscious nor had I lost any memories, but I was pestered with horrible indigestion for about a week afterwards and could never again eat Swiss cheese without being struck down by serious gastrointestinal discomfort.

Not. Fun.

* * *

The fourth time, which would be the time that I defended those two kids and satyr from the dracaenae, I passed out and woke up a few minutes later to find a son of Apollo trickling nectar down my throat. It was a heckuva lot better than the G.I. issues.

I think I stared at him a little too long –– yeah sure, I was the daughter of Death and a shadow-user and a princess of souls and whatever, but now that I was single, I realized that this son of the sun god sure was _hot –– _because he actually had to wave his hand over my eyes to make sure I hadn't gone blind. (I hadn't, duh.) Upon finding that I could still see, he and the other campers sat back and sighed in relief.

"She's alive," Will said.

"Yeah, yeah," I croaked, trying to sit up. There was a sharp pain under my ribs, but I was tough. I'd get over it. I propped myself up on my elbow and felt the grass crunch underneath me. Curious, I looked down, and gave a wry smile when I saw that all grass within a three-meter radius of me had turned a sickly yellow color and died. And I think my clothes and hair were actually smoking. "I'm fine. What happened?"

All of the healers glanced over to the area where I had summoned the undead warrior. It was still nighttime, but even if I hadn't had perfect night vision I would have been able to clearly see the small dirt scar in the grass. My zombie was nowhere to be seen, but I somehow knew that it had found its way back down where it belonged. The two boys from before were in the center of a chattering group of campers and the still-unconscious satyr was being tended to by a few more of Apollo's healers.

Chiron galloped over, holding his bow. "Saige," he called. "I see you have discovered yet another power of yours?"

I smiled weakly before the half-hearted grin lost strength and faded. "I've actually had it for quite a while. Unpleasant results on my part, but it's very effective."

"Oh my god, that was awesome!" squealed a young camper –– no, he wasn't a camper. It was the smaller boy I'd been defending, who had wriggled away from the crowd and skipped over to me. Upon looking at him closer, I saw that he was about eight, maybe nine. He had something of an Indian look to him –– and not the American Indians, but the _real_ Indians from India. His cinnamon brown skin complimented his smooth black hair in a way that my ugly paleish-yellow skin could never do. His clothes were grimy and tattered, like he'd been running for his life for a few days, which he actually had, but his dark eyes had a happy, hyperactive glint to them.

"You were like, rolling down that hill, and then you got to your feet like a ninja or something," the boy continued excitedly, "and then you went up to that weird snake lady and then she was like, 'Oh no I've got a dagger in my butt' and then she just went POOF! into that weird dust stuff, and then you were all like jumping all over the place and whacking their heads, and then when they started coming at me and Dana and Mr. Dendra you, like, stretched out your knife thing and then this awesome zombie guy climbed out and totally OWNED those weird snake ladies! YOU ARE AWESOME! Are you some kind of superhero? Can I have your autograph?!"

He got closer and more excited as he let it all out in one breath. I started backing up, partly out of nervousness and partly out of weirded-out-edness. "Whoa, whoa, kid," I tried to say, but he just kept talking without taking another breath. It was unnerving.

I was spared when the larger kid broke away from the crowd and jogged up after the boy. "Logan!" he barked in a surprisingly deep voice, though it wasn't too surprising if you considered his size. He was about fifteen, but built like an ox and with a face to match –– a son of Ares if I've ever seen one, and trust me, I've seen plenty. "Logan, get back here!"

"Saige," said Chiron anxiously.

"Ignore Dana," said the boy –– Logan?

"Saige, do you think you can stand?" asked Will. "You landed on your ankle pretty bad…"

"Logan!" snapped Dana, glaring murderously at me as he came closer.

And then it became too much. All of this attention. All of this noise.

I really couldn't help myself.

_ "SHUT UP!"_

They all did.

"Now," I continued in a softer voice, "we are going to do this in an _orderly fashion,_ going down the level of my personal preference of relevance. Chiron, you first."

The centaur cleared his throat. "We really must be getting inside the camp's boundaries. Any longer out here with this many campers…"

He didn't need to finish the sentence. Countless demigods were already stampeding towards Thalia's pine like someone had just shouted "Free food!"

Chiron let me ride him and carried me across the boundary and into the camp, because I was still pretty worn out. We stopped at the campfire, along with the rest of the campers and the two new demigods –– because what else could they have been? I was set down in the front, closest to the campfire, which I immediately protested to. I was then granted a seat in the farthest back, but all eyes were still on me.

The eight year old –– Logan –– was still hanging on to me, figuratively of course. His hulking companion Dana (what kind of a guy's name is that?) watched me carefully.

"You are awesome," rambled Logan. "You, like, totally saved us and Dana's weird substitute teacher who never shaves his legs. And he has hooves, too! Like that –– that dude from that one movie with the closet and the lion and the four kids! Yeah! A…faun? Right?"

"No," I said shortly. "That would be the Roman form. He's a satyr."

"So it's all true?" asked the hulking Dana, not without a bit of scorn in his voice. "All of those myths? We're demigods?"

"They're not myths," I muttered. "We're all demigods here. Except for maybe the satyrs and Chiron."

"Then you'd be…what?" scoffed Dana sarcastically. "A demigod of Hades or something?"

"Correction," I said icily, already deciding that I didn't like this kid, "Thanatos. But close."

"Thanatos? Awesome!" exclaimed Logan. "I used to have his card –– you know, for Mythomagic. He was like one thousand fifty attack power, but I think he should'a had more than that. I mean Hades has, like, five thousand attack power, but only if the opponent attacks first, and he's like the same as Thanatos. I just think that what you did was, like, SO COOL! You're better than –– than –– Batman! And that is pretty darn cool. I –– "

I kind of lost it. I just wanted him to _shut up _already. Sure, I could understand ADHD, but this was crossing the line. I reached out and clamped my hand over his mouth. But Dana was also in action –– he lunged forward and slapped my arm. And it hurt. I recoiled, rubbed my arm, and gave him one of my famous death glares. "What was _that _for?" Anyone who knew me, save idiots like Drew, would have instantly given me space. This here was an idiot.

"Don't touch my brother," hissed Dana, who was now standing up. Apparently he wasn't one of the type who didn't believe in the law that you couldn't hit girls. _"Ever."_

"Brother," I repeated scornfully, scanning the two over. They looked absolutely nothing alike. Logan was small and scrawny, Dana was huge and muscular. Save the dark hair and cinnamon skin, there was no similarity. "Right…"

"Saige Annaliase Thanem!" barked Chiron –– at least, if a centaur could bark; in this case should I use _whinnied_ or _neighed_ or something else applying to horses? Ah, never mind. "They are _newcomers!"_

Mostly I was wondering how he knew my middle name. "What?" I asked, wide-eyed. "What'd I do?"

Then someone gasped. I started getting weirded out. "Seriously! What did I do?"

Then I realized they were staring not at me but at someone else. Someone else standing next to me. Well, not exactly at him. More like above his head.

Because above Dana's head floated a little red holographic image of a boar's head impaled by a spear.

The symbol of Ares.

I was right.

The other children of Ares were standing up to welcome their new cabin mate with punches and slaps. But everyone else had more tact. We looked to the small, scrawny Logan sitting next to me…who had nothing above his head. Unclaimed.

"But…you said you were brothers," I said, confused.

Logan fidgeted anxiously. "Well, not exactly," he amended. "Half brothers. Same mom."

"Then if Ares is not your father," said Chiron slowly, "who is?"

It was then that something clicked. I didn't know what it was yet, but I knew it was something. I turned to Logan again and looked at him more closely. The widow's peak hairline, the shape and color of the dark eyes that shimmered gold in the firelight, the structure of the face that was so regal, so chiseled, so cold, so much like my own…

And a millisecond before the penny dropped, or would have dropped, a tall, winged man stepped out of the shadows behind us, dusted off his black tunic, and muttered, "Someone really needs to tell me how to properly claim these kids…"

* * *

**Hehe. Evil cliffy.**

**Please don't kill me…you know who you are…**

**No updates until at least Thursday. Sorry, but I'll be on a school retreat.**

**Seriously. Don't kill me. Just review and rant.**


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